Abstract
The way cells explore their surrounding extracellular matrix (ECM) during development and migration is mediated by lamellipodia at their leading edge, acting as an actual motor pulling the cell forward. Lamellipodia are the primary area within the cell of actin microfilaments (filopodia) formation. In this work, we report on the use of porous silicon (pSi) scaffolds to mimic the ECM of mesenchymal stem cells from the dental pulp (DPSC) and breast cancer (MCF-7) cells. Our atomic force microscopy (AFM), fluorescence microscopy, and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) results show that pSi promoted the appearance of lateral filopodia protruding from the DPSC cell body and not only in the lamellipodia area. The formation of elongated lateral actin filaments suggests that pores provided the necessary anchorage points for protrusion growth. Although MCF-7 cells displayed a lower presence of organized actin network on both pSi and nonporous silicon, pSi stimulated the formation of extended cell protrusions.
Highlights
In the field of regenerative medicine, tissue engineering offers promises for the treatment of various human diseases
We focused on the response of filopodia/lamellipodia to a porous surface at the nanometer scale independently of the chemical treatment; thereby, a simple thermal oxidation of the PSi surfaces was realized
PSi is a promising nanostructured biomaterial scaffold to be used in tissue engineering as it ideally mimics the extracellular matrix (ECM) environment properties, in order to support cell attachment, development, and migration
Summary
In the field of regenerative medicine, tissue engineering offers promises for the treatment of various human diseases. Tissue engineering aims at recreating tissues that are defective or lost and is based on biological substitutes to repair physiological tissue functions by combining cells, bioactive factors, and biomaterial scaffolds [1]. A biomaterial scaffold for tissue engineering should ideally mimic the chemical and mechanical properties of in vivo environment, in order to support cell attachment, proliferation, and differentiation. In this field, porous silicon (pSi) appears to be a promising biomaterial as it is both nontoxic and bioresorbable under physiological conditions and dissolves progressively into nontoxic silicic acid [5,9,10]. PSi structure has been shown to favor calcium phosphate nucleation [17]
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