Nature-Based Electrospun Biomaterial: Harnessing the Advantages of ECM in a Tailor-Made Tissue-Specific Scaffold

The extracellular matrix (ECM) plays a key structural and regulatory role, thus affecting and controlling the tissue regeneration and function. Therefore native decellularized porcine ECM (pECM) was suggested as the ultimate natural biomaterial for tissue engineering as it can offer the cells with the closest mimic to their natural tissue-specific microenvironment. Decellularized pECM scaffolds provide cells with the most accurate biological microenvironment, however they still need to overcome the drawbacks associated with natural materials such as difficulties in controlling or fine tuning their desired properties, lack of reproducibility, and poor mechanical properties.

Acknowledging the need for scaffolds that are natural, biocompatible and bioactive on one hand, and controllable, reproducible and scalable on the other hand, we have designed, for the first time, scaffolds that are produced from whole decellularized pECM using electrospinning technology, a simple bottom-up approach for the robust production of organized, controllable fibers.

The electrospun pECM scaffolds were produced from different tissues, thus preserving the unique, tissue-specific collagenous composition of the ECM, and the collagen molecular structure. Electrospun pECM fibers resembled the native ECM in their diameter distribution. What`s more, upon wetting, the matrix had self-assembled into an isotropic structure identical to that of tissue ECM. Further, mechanical properties similar to native ECM were achieved through controlling scaffold dimensions and macrostructure.

The cytocompatibility and bioactivity of the electrospun pECM scaffolds were demonstrated through supporting the viability, proliferation and tissue-specific function of cultured cells, which had also remodeled it through both anabolic and catabolic gene expression. The scaffolds biocompatibility was assessed in vitro and in vivo using a mouse model, thus producing no significant immunological response following their implantation. Overall, this novel platform can open the gate for using ECM from any source organ as a natural, biocompatible, and bioactive material, in diverse biomedical applications where tailor-made, complex structures and well-defined mechanical properties are required.