Hydroentangled nonwoven eri silk fibroin scaffold for tissue engineering applications

Abstract

Electrospun scaffolds are being widely studied for its potential application in tissue engineering because of its nanostructure that mimics the extracellular matrices. Although it has several advantages, it lacks mechanical strength and causes structural deformation during handling of the scaffold. It is well known that the textile-based structures like woven and nonwoven fabrics have excellent structural stability. In this study, a woven and a hydroentangled nonwoven fabric were fabricated from eri silk fibroin and their characteristics were compared with electrospun scaffold. The functional groups, contact angle, thermal degradation, hemocompatibility studies showed that all the three scaffolds can be used as biomaterials. The pore and pore size distribution were better with electrospun scaffold due to smaller fiber diameter and more number of layers of fibers. The tensile behaviour was found to be better for woven and nonwoven scaffolds. The enzymatic degradation showed that the stability of woven and nonwoven scaffolds were better and electrospun scaffold degrades and disintegrates quickly. Mouse 3T3 L1 fibroblast and Human Wharton’s jelly Mesenchymal Stem Cells adhered on all the three scaffolds and a higher attachment and growth coverage were obtained on the electrospun and nonwoven scaffolds. It was found that the hydroentangled nonwoven silk scaffold exhibited similar biological characteristics as that of electrospun scaffold and also had higher mechanical strength and structural stability. Hence, it is inferred that the hydroentangled nonwoven scaffold can be considered as a suitable structure for tissue engineering applications.