The Influence of Textile Structure Characteristics on the Performance of Artificial Blood Vessels.

Cardiovascular disease is a major threat to human health worldwide, and vascular transplantation surgery is a treatment method for this disease. Often, autologous blood vessels cannot meet the needs of surgery. However, allogeneic blood vessels have limited availability or may cause rejection reactions.

Side population cells derived from hUCMSCs and hPMSCs could inhibit the malignant behaviors of Tn colorectal cancer cells from modifying their O-glycosylation status.

Background: Cosmc (C1GalT1C1) mutation could cause aberrant O-glycosylation and result in expression of Tn antigen on the surface of tumor cells (Tn cells), which is associated with the metastasis and prognosis of cancer progression. Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) could participate in immunoregulation, tissue damage repair, and tumor inhibition and be seen as an ideal candidate for tumor therapy due to their inherent capacity to migrate to tumor sites. However, their therapeutic effectiveness in different tumors is inconsistent and still controversial.

Morphology of Biomaterials Affect O-Glycosylation of HUVECs.

Biomaterials have been widely used as substitutes for diseased tissue in surgery and have gained great success and attention. At present, the biocompatibility of biomaterials such as PET woven fabrics is often evaluated both in vitro and in vivo. However, the current experimental methods cannot reveal the relationship between material surfaces and cell adhesion, and few research works have focused on the mechanisms of how the surface morphology of biomaterials affects cell adhesion and proliferation.

Precise Control of the Preparation of Proton Exchange Membranes via Direct Electrostatic Deposition.

In this work, we reported a novel preparation method for a proton exchange membrane (PEM) named, the direct electrostatic deposition method. In theory, any required thickness and size of PEM can be precisely controlled via this method. By direct electrostatic spraying of Nafion solution containing amino modified SiO nanoparticles onto a metal collector, a hybrid membrane of 30 μm thickness was fabricated.

Cosmc transfection decreases malignant behavior of Tn cells and enhances sensitivity to apoptosis when induced by Apo2L/TRAIL via alteration of O-glycan structure.

Cosmc mutations may cause abnormal O-glycosylation and result in Tn antigen expression. In the current study, it was discovered that proliferation and migration of Tn+ cells (Jurkat T and LS174T-Tn cells) with mutant Cosmc decreased after transfected Cosmc, and their sensitivity to apoptosis induced by Apo2L/TRAIL increased. Core 1-, 2-, and 3-derived O-glycans were absent in Tn cells.

Hydrogel Small-Diameter Vascular Graft Reinforced with a Braided Fiber Strut with Improved Mechanical Properties.

Acute thrombosis remains the main limitation of small-diameter vascular grafts (inner diameter <6 mm) for bridging and bypassing of small arteries defects and occlusion. The use of hydrogel tubes represents a promising strategy. However, their low mechanical strength and high swelling tendency may limit their further application.

Control of weft yarn or density improves biocompatibility of PET small diameter artificial blood vessels.

Polyethylene glycol terephthalate (PET) fabrics with woven structures have proved to be quite effective for use on large diameter artificial blood vessels. However, their use within small-diameter artificial blood vessels has been associated with poor long-term patency, a problem resulting from slow endothelialization on PET and an over hyperplasia of smooth muscle cells. Previous research from our laboratory has revealed that ICAM-1 can be used as a marker to investigate cell adhesion, an effect which was closely associated with cell behavior on the surface of polycaprolactone (PCL) films.

PCL films of varying porosity influence ICAM-1 expression of HUVECs.

Here, we investigate the relationship between the expression of intercellular adhesion molecule-1 (ICAM-1) and the adhesion of human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) on a poly-ε-caprolactone (PCL) film with micropores of different pore sizes. The results showed that surface hydrophilicity increased with larger pore sizes, while surfaces became less hydrophilic as the pore size decreased. The ability for adhesion and proliferation of HUVECs on surfaces with larger pore sizes was enhanced as compared with that of surfaces with smaller pore sizes or a flat film.

Surface Modification and Characterisation of Silk Fibroin Fabric Produced by the Layer-by-Layer Self-Assembly of Multilayer Alginate/Regenerated Silk Fibroin.

Silk-based medical products have a long history of use as a material for surgical sutures because of their desirable mechanical properties. However, silk fibroin fabric has been reported to be haemolytic when in direct contact with blood. The layer-by-layer self-assembly technique provides a method for surface modification to improve the biocompatibility of silk fibroin fabrics.

Preparation and evaluation of bicomponent and homogeneous polyester silk small diameter arterial prostheses.

The development of a small diameter (≤5 mm) arterial prosthesis requires the appropriate selection of materials, structure and fabrication method so as to provide adequate mechanical properties, superior biocompatibility and precise control over the diameter. In this study, 100% polyester, 100% silk fibroin and a combination of both yarns were woven into seamless tubular prototype prostheses with different basic weaves. After degumming/scouring they met a target inner diameter of 3.