On-Chip Fabrication of Cell-Attached Microstructures using Photo-Cross-Linkable Biodegradable Hydrogel

Journal of Functional Biomaterials

Eunhye Kim¹  Toshio Fukuda¹  Taro Kozuka¹  Qiang Huang¹  Akihiko Ichikawa¹  Yasuhisa Hasegawa²  Masaru Takeuchi² 

[1] Department of Mechatronics Engineering, Meijo University, Nagoya 4688502, Japan;Department of Micro-Nano Mechanical Science and Engineering, Nagoya University, Nagoya 4648603, Japan;

关键词: microfabrication;    cell culture;    microfluidics;    biodegradable material;    photo cross-linkable material;   

DOI  :  10.3390/jfb11010018

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

We developed a procedure for fabricating movable biological cell structures using biodegradable materials on a microfluidic chip. A photo-cross-linkable biodegradable hydrogel gelatin methacrylate (GelMA) was used to fabricate arbitrary microstructure shapes under a microscope using patterned ultraviolet light. The GelMA microstructures were movable inside the microfluidic channel after applying a hydrophobic coating material. The fabricated microstructures were self-assembled inside the microfluidic chip using our method of fluid forcing. The synthesis procedure of GelMA was optimized by changing the dialysis temperature, which kept the GelMA at a suitable pH for cell culture. RLC-18 rat liver cells (Riken BioResource Research Center, Tsukuba, Japan) were cultured inside the GelMA and on the GelMA microstructures to check cell growth. The cells were then stretched for 1 day in the cell culture and grew well on the GelMA microstructures. However, they did not grow well inside the GelMA microstructures. The GelMA microstructures were partially dissolved after 4 days of cell culture because of their biodegradability after the cells were placed on the microstructures. The results indicated that the proposed procedure used to fabricate cell structures using GelMA can be used as a building block to assemble three-dimensional tissue-like cell structures in vitro inside microfluidic devices.

【 授权许可】

Unknown