Three-dimensional polycaprolactone scaffold via needleless electrospinning promotes cell proliferation and infiltration

Abstract

Electrospinning has been widely used in fabrication of tissue engineering scaffolds. Currently, most of the electrospun nanofibers performed like a conventional two-dimensional (2D) membrane, which hindered their further applications. Moreover, the low production rate of the traditional needle-electrospinning (NE) also limited the commercialization. In this article, disc-electrospinning (DE) was utilized to fabricate a three-dimensional (3D) scaffold consisting of porous macro/nanoscale fibers. The morphology of the porous structure was investigated by scanning electron microscopy images, which showed irregular pores of nanoscale spreading on the surface of DE polycaprolactone (PCL) fibers. Protein adsorption assessment illustrated the porous structure could significantly enhance proteins pickup, which was 55% higher than that of solid fiber scaffolds. Fibroblasts were cultured on the scaffold. The results demonstrated that DE fiber scaffold could enhance initial cell attachment. In the 7 days of culture, fibroblasts grew faster on DE fiber scaffold in comparison with solid fiber, solvent cast (SC) film and TCP. Fibroblasts on DE fibers showed a stretched shape and integrated with the porous surface tightly. Cells were also found to migrate into the DE scaffold up to 800μm. Results supported the use of DE PCL fibers as a 3D tissue engineering scaffold in soft tissue regeneration.