• 文献标题:   Enhancing the Conductivity of Cell-Laden Alginate Microfibers With Aqueous Graphene for Neural Applications
  • 文献类型:   Article
  • 作  者:   MCNAMARA MC, NIARAKIASLI AE, GUO JS, OKUZONO J, MONTAZAMI R, HASHEMI NN
  • 作者关键词:   alginate microfiber, graphene, conductivity, cell encapsulation, 3d cell coculture, microfluidic, neural cell
  • 出版物名称:   FRONTIERS IN MATERIALS
  • ISSN:   2296-8016
  • 通讯作者地址:   Iowa State Univ
  • 被引频次:   0
  • DOI:   10.3389/fmats.2020.00061
  • 出版年:   2020

▎ 摘  要

Microfluidically manufacturing graphene-alginate microfibers create possibilities for encapsulating rat neural cells within conductive 3D tissue scaffolding to enable the creation of real-time 3D sensing arrays with high physiological relavancy. Cells are encapsulated using the biopolymer alginate, which is combined with graphene to create a cell-containing hydrogel with increased electrical conductivity. Resulting novel alginate-graphene microfibers showed a 2.5-fold increase over pure alginate microfibers, but did not show significant differences in size and porosity. Cells encapsulated within the microfibers survive for up to 8 days, and maintain similar to 20% live cells over that duration. The biocompatible aqueous graphene suspension used in this investigation was obtained via liquid phase exfoliation of pristine graphite, to create a graphene-alginate pre-hydrogel solution.