Microscale scaffolds with diverse morphology via electrohydrodynamic jetting for in vitro cell culture application

Abstract

Microscale scaffolds have been intensively used in tissue engineering for cell culture. Traditionally, top-down approach like solvent casting, gas foaming and freeze drying to fabricate the scaffolds suffer from the drawback of variable microstructures of the scaffolds, pore sizes, and specific surface areas, which are important factors for reproducible cell culture application. To overcome these problems, bottom-up approach which builds up from single component has been preferred for manufacturing of scaffolds. One such technology is electrohydrodynamic jetting (EHDJ), which can produce controllable fiber diameter and orientation. Herein, we reported our progress on new design and printing of polycaprolactone (PCL) scaffolds with linear, serpentine, and hybrid structures. These are achieved by altering fabrication parameters using EHDJ technique. The three scaffolds exhibit high resolution and small pore structures suitable as support for 3D cell cultures as demonstrated by using fibroblast cells. Our results showed that although the hybrid scaffold has lower porosity than the line scaffold, more cells are found on the hybrid scaffold attributed to improved cell attachment and proliferation. Taken together, our results pave the road for design and printing of similar scaffolds with high resolution and precision controlled structural morphologies for in vitro cell culture and tissue engineering.