Abstract
Tissue engineering using a biomaterial including bioactive compounds has been researched as a way to restore injured neural systems. Extracellular polymeric substances (EPS) extracted from marine seaweeds have been known to produce positive effects on physiological activities in human tissues. In this study, an electrospun nanofiber containing brown seaweed EPS was proven to be a candidate biomaterial for neural tissue engineering. Glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) as a specific marker protein increased in the astrocytes cultured on the polycaprolactone (PCL) nanofiber containing EPS (EPS‐PCL nanofiber), compared with PCL nanofiber. The upregulation of GFAP indicates that the EPS‐PCL nanofiber induced astrocyte activation, which supports physiological agents favorable to restore injured neural tissue. Astrocytes could infiltrate into the EPS‐PCL nanofiber mat without toxicity, comparable to PCL nanofiber. These results imply that EPS‐PCL nanofiber could be a useful biomaterial to regulate astrocyte activity at a molecular level and could be considered as a novel therapeutic material for neural tissue engineering.
Highlights
Regarding central nervous system (CNS) injuries, astrocytes are one of many glial cells that are important in supporting neural systems to operate correctly [1, 2]
Glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) is an important biomarker to determine the state of astrocytes, which is involved in the CNS injury response and plays a critical role in neural tissue organization
There have been several studies about nanofibers and polysaccharides applied to astrocytes, but cooperative effects of nanofibers containing polysaccharides on astrocytes have rarely been researched, and in particular, molecular studies have not yet been reported
Summary
Regarding central nervous system (CNS) injuries, astrocytes are one of many glial cells that are important in supporting neural systems to operate correctly [1, 2]. Astrocytes are regarded as curative agents in therapy of CNS injuries [3], while they are known to interfere with neural regeneration [4, 5]. GFAP is an important biomarker to determine the state of astrocytes, which is involved in the CNS injury response and plays a critical role in neural tissue organization. Three typical ways have been used to treat CNS injuries: drug delivery, cell therapy, and tissue engineering. As in drug delivery, cell therapy has been actively administered in conjunction with biomaterials in order to better control the injected cell’s fate while benefiting the injured nerve tissue. A neural tissue engineering approach is highlighted in terms of control of drugs and cell therapy within the injured tissue
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