Drawn aligned polymer microfibres for tissue engineering

Abstract

Oriented fibres and materials based on orientated fibres have great potential for use in tissue engineering for tissues, where the arrangement of extracellular matrix is fundamental. The drawing method is based on mechanical pulling of a polymer solution out of its base droplet, resulting in a solidified fibre of determined geometrical characteristics. A new machine designed for lab scale drawing was invented enabling a repeatable quality of drawing conditions. The results demonstrate that it is possible to influence and define the fibre diameter and its distribution. From the in vitro experiments, it is evident that the aligned fibres guide the cell growth in the direction of the fibres. Moreover, the prepared fibres were functionalised with polypyrrole as an example of their versatility. These features make drawing an easy and suitable tool for the fabrication of scaffolds with a precise structure for tissues, e.g. nerve tissue.