Development of a three dimensional (3D) knitted scaffold for myocardial tissue engineering. Part I: mechanical performance of the knitted structures

Abstract

The aim of this study was to design a knitted scaffold for myocardial tissue engineering applications. The textile structure of pile loop knit fabric (terry fabric) was selected as a three dimensional (3 D) scaffold. The candidate fabrics were knitted from textured polyethylene terephthalate (PET) yarns. Biocompatible porous structures were obtained and the mechanical properties of the fabrics were analyzed. The values of the stiffness (Young’s modulus) of the structures were observed to range from 124.09 to 167.01 kPa in the direction of wales, and from 40.16 to 85.28 kPa in the direction of courses at 20% strain, which can be stated not to be far from those reported for the human myocardium. Furthermore, the knit structures were observed to have a pore network mainly consisting of macropores of 100 − 400 µm that were well interconnected with micropores (<60 µm). In this respect, the developed scaffolds could potentially be used as biocompatible materials for the applications of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine.