A bioprinted and scalable model of human tubulo-interstitial kidney fibrosis.

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) affects more than 10% of the global population. As kidney function negatively correlates with the presence of interstitial fibrosis, the development of new anti-fibrotic therapies holds promise to stabilize functional decline in CKD patients. The goal of the study was to generate a scalable bioprinted 3-dimensional kidney tubulo-interstitial disease model of kidney fibrosis.

Transformative Materials to Create 3D Functional Human Tissue Models In Vitro in a Reproducible Manner.

Recreating human tissues and organs in the petri dish to establish models as tools in biomedical sciences has gained momentum. These models can provide insight into mechanisms of human physiology, disease onset, and progression, and improve drug target validation, as well as the development of new medical therapeutics. Transformative materials play an important role in this evolution, as they can be programmed to direct cell behavior and fate by controlling the activity of bioactive molecules and material properties.

Ethylene Polymerization-Induced Self-Assembly (PISA) of Poly(ethylene oxide)-block-polyethylene Copolymers via RAFT.

Poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO) with dithiocarbamate chain ends (PEO-SC(=S)-N(CH )Ph and PEO-SC(=S)-NPh , named PEO-1 and PEO-2, respectively) were used as macromolecular chain-transfer agents (macro-CTAs) to mediate the reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) polymerization of ethylene in dimethyl carbonate (DMC) under relatively mild conditions (80 °C, 80 bar). While only a slow consumption of PEO-1 was observed, the rapid consumption of PEO-2 led to a clean chain extension and the formation of a polyethylene (PE) segment. Upon polymerization, the resulting block copolymers PEO-b-PE self-assembled into nanometric objects according to a polymerization-induced self-assembly (PISA).

Aromatic Xanthates and Dithiocarbamates for the Polymerization of Ethylene through Reversible Addition-Fragmentation Chain Transfer (RAFT).

Aromatic xanthates and dithiocarbamates were used as chain-transfer agents (CTAs) in reversible addition-fragmentation chain-transfer (RAFT) polymerizations of ethylene under milder conditions (≤80 °C, ≤200 bar). While detrimental side fragmentation of the intermediate radical leading to loss of living chain-ends was observed before with alkyl xanthate CTAs, this was absent for the aromatic CTAs. The loss of living chain-ends was nevertheless detected for the aromatic xanthates via a different mechanism based on cross-termination.