Customizable engineered blood vessels using 3D printed inserts.

Current techniques for tissue engineering blood vessels are not customizable for vascular size variation and vessel wall thickness. These critical parameters vary widely between the different arteries in the human body, and the ability to engineer vessels of varying sizes could increase capabilities for disease modeling and treatment options. We present an innovative method for producing customizable, tissue engineered, self-organizing vascular constructs by replicating a major structural component of blood vessels - the smooth muscle layer, or tunica media.