Zhiming Shen, Fei Sun, Yibo Shan, Yi Lu, Cong Wu, Boyou Zhang, Qiang Wu, Lei Yuan, Jianwei Zhu, Qi Wang, Yilun Wang, Wenxuan Chen, Yaojing Zhang, Wenlong Yang, Yiwei Fan, Hongcan Shi
Functional vascularization is crucial for maintaining the long-term patency of tissue-engineered trachea and repairing defective trachea. Herein, we report the construction and evaluation of a novel cell-free tissue-engineered tracheal scaffold that effectively promotes vascularization of the graft. Our findings demonstrated that exosomes derived from endothelial progenitor cells (EPC-Exos) enhance the proliferation, migration, and tube formation of endothelial cells. Taking advantage of the angiogenic properties of EPC-Exos, we utilized methacrylate gelatin (GelMA) as a carrier for endothelial progenitor cell exosomes and encapsulated them within a 3D-printed polycaprolactone (PCL) scaffold to fabricate a composite tracheal scaffold...
December 2023: Materials today. Bio