Engineering Gels with Time-Evolving Viscoelasticity

Harnessing multifunctional collagen mimetic peptides to create bioinspired stimuli responsive hydrogels for controlled cell culture

The demand for synthetic soft materials with bioinspired structures continues to grow. Material applications range from in vitro and in vivo tissue mimics to therapeutic delivery systems, where well-defined synthetic building blocks offer precise and reproducible property control. This work examines a synthetic assembling peptide, specifically a multifunctional collagen mimetic peptide (mfCMP) either alone or with reactive macromers, for the creation of responsive hydrogels that capture aspects of soft collagen-rich tissues. We first explored how buffer choice impacts mfCMP hierarchical assembly, in particular, peptide melting temperature, fibril morphology, and ability to form physical hydrogels. Assembly in physiologically relevant buffer resulted in collagen-like fibrillar structures and physically assembled hydrogels with shear-thinning (as indicated through strain-yielding) and self-healing properties. Further, we aimed to create fully synthetic, composite peptide-polymer hydrogels with dynamic responses to various stimuli, inspired by the extracellular matrix (ECM). Specifically, we established mfCMP-poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) hydrogel compositions that demonstrate increasing non-linear viscoelasticity in response to applied strain as the amount of assembled mfCMP content increases. Furthermore, the thermal responsiveness of mfCMP physical crosslinks was harnessed to manipulate the composite hydrogel mechanical properties in response to changes in temperature. Finally, cells relevant in wound healing, human lung fibroblasts, were encapsulated within these peptide-polymer hydrogels to explore the impact of increased mfCMP, and the resulting changes in viscoelasticity, on cell response. This work establishes mfCMP building blocks as versatile tools for creating hybrid and adaptable systems with applications ranging from injectable shear-thinning materials to responsive interfaces and synthetic ECMs for tissue engineering.

Matrix Viscoelasticity Tunes the Mechanobiological Behavior of Chondrocytes

In articular cartilage, the pericellular matrix acting as a specialized mechanical microenvironment modulates environmental signals to chondrocytes through mechanotransduction. Matrix viscoelastic alterations during cartilage development and osteoarthritis (OA) degeneration play an important role in regulating chondrocyte fate and cartilage matrix homeostasis. In recent years, scientists are gradually realizing the importance of matrix viscoelasticity in regulating chondrocyte function and phenotype. Notably, this is an emerging field, and this review summarizes the existing literatures to the best of our knowledge. This review provides an overview of the viscoelastic properties of hydrogels and the role of matrix viscoelasticity in directing chondrocyte behavior. In this review, we elaborated the mechanotransuction mechanisms by which cells sense and respond to the viscoelastic environment and also discussed the underlying signaling pathways. Moreover, emerging insights into the role of matrix viscoelasticity in regulating chondrocyte function and cartilage formation shed light into designing cell-instructive biomaterial. We also describe the potential use of viscoelastic biomaterials in cartilage tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. Future perspectives on mechanobiological comprehension of the viscoelastic behaviors involved in tissue homeostasis, cellular responses, and biomaterial design are highlighted. Finally, this review also highlights recent strategies utilizing viscoelastic hydrogels for designing cartilage-on-a-chip.

Rheological Considerations of Pharmaceutical Formulations: Focus on Viscoelasticity

Controlling rheological properties offers the opportunity to gain insight into the physical characteristics, structure, stability and drug release rate of formulations. To better understand the physical properties of hydrogels, not only rotational but also oscillatory experiments should be performed. Viscoelastic properties, including elastic and viscous properties, are measured using oscillatory rheology. The gel strength and elasticity of hydrogels are of great importance for pharmaceutical development as the application of viscoelastic preparations has considerably expanded in recent decades. Viscosupplementation, ophthalmic surgery and tissue engineering are just a few examples from the wide range of possible applications of viscoelastic hydrogels. Hyaluronic acid, alginate, gellan gum, pectin and chitosan are remarkable representatives of gelling agents that attract great attention applied in biomedical fields. This review provides a brief summary of rheological properties, highlighting the viscoelasticity of hydrogels with great potential in biomedicine.

Bioinspired Hydrogels as Platforms for Life-Science Applications: Challenges and Opportunities

Hydrogels, as interconnected networks (polymer mesh; physically, chemically, or dynamic crosslinked networks) incorporating a high amount of water, present structural characteristics similar to soft natural tissue. They enable the diffusion of different molecules (ions, drugs, and grow factors) and have the ability to take over the action of external factors. Their nature provides a wide variety of raw materials and inspiration for functional soft matter obtained by complex mechanisms and hierarchical self-assembly. Over the last decade, many studies focused on developing innovative and high-performance materials, with new or improved functions, by mimicking biological structures at different length scales. Hydrogels with natural or synthetic origin can be engineered as bulk materials, micro- or nanoparticles, patches, membranes, supramolecular pathways, bio-inks, etc. The specific features of hydrogels make them suitable for a wide variety of applications, including tissue engineering scaffolds (repair/regeneration), wound healing, drug delivery carriers, bio-inks, soft robotics, sensors, actuators, catalysis, food safety, and hygiene products. This review is focused on recent advances in the field of bioinspired hydrogels that can serve as platforms for life-science applications. A brief outlook on the actual trends and future directions is also presented.

Viscoelasticity Acts as a Marker for Tumor Extracellular Matrix Characteristics

Biological materials such as extracellular matrix scaffolds, cancer cells, and tissues are often assumed to respond elastically for simplicity; the viscoelastic response is quite commonly ignored. Extracellular matrix mechanics including the viscoelasticity has turned out to be a key feature of cellular behavior and the entire shape and function of healthy and diseased tissues, such as cancer. The interference of cells with their local microenvironment and the interaction among different cell types relies both on the mechanical phenotype of each involved element. However, there is still not yet clearly understood how viscoelasticity alters the functional phenotype of the tumor extracellular matrix environment. Especially the biophysical technologies are still under ongoing improvement and further development. In addition, the effect of matrix mechanics in the progression of cancer is the subject of discussion. Hence, the topic of this review is especially attractive to collect the existing endeavors to characterize the viscoelastic features of tumor extracellular matrices and to briefly highlight the present frontiers in cancer progression and escape of cancers from therapy. Finally, this review article illustrates the importance of the tumor extracellular matrix mechano-phenotype, including the phenomenon viscoelasticity in identifying, characterizing, and treating specific cancer types.

Bioprinting of Collagen Type I and II via Aerosol Jet Printing for the Replication of Dense Collagenous Tissues

Collagen has grown increasingly present in bioprinting, however collagen bioprinting has mostly been limited to the extrusion printing of collagen type I to form weak collagen hydrogels. While these weak collagen hydrogels have their applications, synthetic polymers are often required to reinforce gel-laden constructs that aim to replicate dense collagenous tissues found in vivo. In this study, aerosol jet printing (AJP) was used to print and process collagen type I and II into dense constructs with a greater capacity to replicate the dense collagenous ECM found in connective tissues. Collagen type I and II was isolated from animal tissues to form solutions for printing. Collagen type I and II constructs were printed with 576 layers and measured to have average effective elastic moduli of 241.3 ± 94.3 and 196.6 ± 86.0 kPa (±SD), respectively, without any chemical modification. Collagen type II solutions were measured to be less viscous than type I and both collagen type I and II exhibited a drop in viscosity due to AJP. Circular dichroism and SDS-PAGE showed collagen type I to be more vulnerable to structural changes due to the stresses of the aerosol formation step of aerosol jet printing while the collagen type II triple helix was largely unaffected. SEM illustrated that distinct layers remained in the aerosol jet print constructs. The results show that aerosol jet printing should be considered an effective way to process collagen type I and II into stiff dense constructs with suitable mechanical properties for the replication of dense collagenous connective tissues.

"Viscotaxis"- directed migration of mesenchymal stem cells in response to loss modulus gradient

Directed cell migration plays a crucial role in physiological and pathological conditions. One important mechanical cue, known to influence cell migration, is the gradient of substrate elastic modulus (E). However, the cellular microenvironment is viscoelastic and hence the elastic property alone is not sufficient to define its material characteristics. To bridge this gap, in this study, we investigated the influence of the gradient of viscous property of the substrate, as defined by loss modulus (G″) on cell migration. We cultured human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs) on a collagen-coated polyacrylamide gel with constant storage modulus (G') but with a gradient in the loss modulus (G″). We found hMSCs to migrate from high to low loss modulus. We have termed this form of directional cellular migration as "Viscotaxis". We hypothesize that the high loss modulus regime deforms more due to creep in the long timescale when subjected to cellular traction. Such differential deformation drives the observed Viscotaxis. To verify our hypothesis, we disrupted the actomyosin contractility with myosin inhibitor blebbistatin and ROCK inhibitor Y27632, and found the directional migration to disappear. Further, such time-dependent creep of the high loss material should lead to lower traction, shorter lifetime of the focal adhesions, and dynamic cell morphology, which was indeed found to be the case. Together, findings in this paper highlight the importance of considering the viscous modulus while preparing stiffness-based substrates for the field of tissue engineering. STATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE: While the effect of substrate elastic modulus has been investigated extensively in the context of cell biology, the role of substrate viscoelasticity is poorly understood. This omission is surprising as our body is not elastic, but viscoelastic. Hence, the role of viscoelasticity needs to be investigated at depth in various cellular contexts. One such important context is cell migration. Cell migration is important in morphogenesis, immune response, wound healing, and cancer, to name a few. While it is known that cells migrate when presented with a substrate with a rigidity gradient, cellular behavior in response to viscoelastic gradient has never been investigated. The findings of this paper not only reveal a completely novel cellular taxis or directed migration, it also improves our understanding of cell mechanics significantly.

Characterising and engineering biomimetic materials for viscoelastic mechanotransduction studies

The mechanical behavior of soft tissue extracellular matrix is time dependent. Moreover, it evolves over time due to physiological processes as well as aging and disease. Measuring and quantifying the time-dependent mechanical behavior of soft tissues and materials pose a challenge, not only because of their labile and hydrated nature but also because of the lack of a common definition of terms and understanding of models for characterizing viscoelasticity. Here, we review the most important measurement techniques and models used to determine the viscoelastic properties of soft hydrated materials—or hydrogels—underlining the difference between viscoelastic behavior and the properties and descriptors used to quantify viscoelasticity. We then discuss the principal factors, which determine tissue viscoelasticity in vivo and summarize what we currently know about cell response to time-dependent materials, outlining fundamental factors that have to be considered when interpreting results. Particular attention is given to the relationship between the different time scales involved (mechanical, cellular and observation time scales), as well as scaling principles, all of which must be considered when designing viscoelastic materials and performing experiments for biomechanics or mechanobiology applications. From this overview, key considerations and directions for furthering insights and applications in the emergent field of cell viscoelastic mechanotransduction are provided.

High-Resolution Bioprinting of Recombinant Human Collagen Type III

The development of commercial collagen inks for extrusion-based bioprinting has increased the amount of research on pure collagen bioprinting, i.e., collagen inks not mixed with gelatin, alginate, or other more common biomaterial inks. New printing techniques have also improved the resolution achievable with pure collagen bioprinting. However, the resultant collagen constructs still appear too weak to replicate dense collagenous tissues, such as the cornea. This work aims to demonstrate the first reported case of bioprinted recombinant collagen films with suitable optical and mechanical properties for corneal tissue engineering. The printing technology used, aerosol jet® printing (AJP), is a high-resolution printing method normally used to deposit conductive inks for electronic printing. In this work, AJP was employed to deposit recombinant human collagen type III (RHCIII) in overlapping continuous lines of 60 µm to form thin layers. Layers were repeated up to 764 times to result in a construct that was considered a few hundred microns thick when swollen. Samples were subsequently neutralised and crosslinked using EDC:NHS crosslinking. Nanoindentation and absorbance measurements were conducted, and the results show that the AJP-deposited RHCIII samples possess suitable mechanical and optical properties for corneal tissue engineering: an average effective elastic modulus of 506 ± 173 kPa and transparency ≥87% at all visible wavelengths. Circular dichroism showed that there was some loss of helicity of the collagen due to aerosolisation. SDS-PAGE and pepsin digestion were used to show that while some collagen is degraded due to aerosolisation, it remains an inaccessible substrate for pepsin cleavage.

Engineering and Monitoring 3D Cell Constructs with Time-Evolving Viscoelasticity for the Study of Liver Fibrosis In Vitro

Liver fibrosis is generally associated with an over-production and crosslinking of extracellular matrix proteins, causing a progressive increase in both the elastic and viscous properties of the hepatic tissue. We describe a strategy for mimicking and monitoring the mechano-dynamics of the 3D microenvironment associated with liver fibrosis. Cell-laden gelatin hydrogels were crosslinked with microbial transglutaminase using a purpose-designed cytocompatible two-step protocol, which allows for the exposure of cells to a mechanically changing environment during culturing. A bioreactor was re-engineered to monitor the mechanical properties of cell constructs over time. The results showed a shift towards a more elastic (i.e., solid-like) behaviour, which is likely related to an increase in cell stress. The method effectively mimics the time-evolving mechanical microenvironment associated with liver fibrosis and could provide novel insights into pathophysiological processes in which both elastic and viscous properties of tissues change over time.

Progress in the mechanical modulation of cell functions in tissue engineering

In mammals, mechanics at multiple stages-nucleus to cell to ECM-underlie multiple physiological and pathological functions from its development to reproduction to death. Under this inspiration, substantial research has established the role of multiple aspects of mechanics in regulating fundamental cellular processes, including spreading, migration, growth, proliferation, and differentiation. However, our understanding of how these mechanical mechanisms are orchestrated or tuned at different stages to maintain or restore the healthy environment at the tissue or organ level remains largely a mystery. Over the past few decades, research in the mechanical manipulation of the surrounding environment-known as substrate or matrix or scaffold on which, or within which, cells are seeded-has been exceptionally enriched in the field of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. To do so, traditional tissue engineering aims at recapitulating key mechanical milestones of native ECM into a substrate for guiding the cell fate and functions towards specific tissue regeneration. Despite tremendous progress, a big puzzle that remains is how the cells compute a host of mechanical cues, such as stiffness (elasticity), viscoelasticity, plasticity, non-linear elasticity, anisotropy, mechanical forces, and mechanical memory, into many biological functions in a cooperative, controlled, and safe manner. High throughput understanding of key cellular decisions as well as associated mechanosensitive downstream signaling pathway(s) for executing these decisions in response to mechanical cues, solo or combined, is essential to address this issue. While many reports have been made towards the progress and understanding of mechanical cues-particularly, substrate bulk stiffness and viscoelasticity-in regulating the cellular responses, a complete picture of mechanical cues is lacking. This review highlights a comprehensive view on the mechanical cues that are linked to modulate many cellular functions and consequent tissue functionality. For a very basic understanding, a brief discussion of the key mechanical players of ECM and the principle of mechanotransduction process is outlined. In addition, this review gathers together the most important data on the stiffness of various cells and ECM components as well as various tissues/organs and proposes an associated link from the mechanical perspective that is not yet reported. Finally, beyond addressing the challenges involved in tuning the interplaying mechanical cues in an independent manner, emerging advances in designing biomaterials for tissue engineering are also explored.

Determination by Relaxation Tests of the Mechanical Properties of Soft Polyacrylamide Gels Made for Mechanobiology Studies

Following the general aim of recapitulating the native mechanical properties of tissues and organs in vitro, the field of materials science and engineering has benefited from recent progress in developing compliant substrates with physical and chemical properties similar to those of biological materials. In particular, in the field of mechanobiology, soft hydrogels can now reproduce the precise range of stiffnesses of healthy and pathological tissues to study the mechanisms behind cell responses to mechanics. However, it was shown that biological tissues are not only elastic but also relax at different timescales. Cells can, indeed, perceive this dissipation and actually need it because it is a critical signal integrated with other signals to define adhesion, spreading and even more complicated functions. The mechanical characterization of hydrogels used in mechanobiology is, however, commonly limited to the elastic stiffness (Young's modulus) and this value is known to depend greatly on the measurement conditions that are rarely reported in great detail. Here, we report that a simple relaxation test performed under well-defined conditions can provide all the necessary information for characterizing soft materials mechanically, by fitting the dissipation behavior with a generalized Maxwell model (GMM). The simple method was validated using soft polyacrylamide hydrogels and proved to be very useful to readily unveil precise mechanical properties of gels that cells can sense and offer a set of characteristic values that can be compared with what is typically reported from microindentation tests.

Indentation probe with optical fibre array-based optical coherence tomography for material deformation

We present a new optomechanical probe for mechanical testing of soft matter. The probe consists of a micromachined cantilever equipped with an indenting sphere, and an array of 16 single‐mode optical fibres, which are connected to an optical coherence tomography (OCT) system that allows subsurface analysis of the sample during the indentation stroke. To test our device and its capability, we performed indentation on a PDMS‐based phantom. Our findings demonstrate that Common Path (CP)‐OCT via lensed optical fibres can be successfully combined with a microindentation sensor to visualise the phantom's deformation profile at different indentation depths and locations in real time.

Lay Description

This work presents a new approach to simultaneously perform micro‐indentation experiments and OCT imaging. An optical fiber array‐based sensor is used to develop a new hybrid tool where micro‐indentation is combined with optical coherence tomography. The sensor is therefore capable of compressing a sample with a small force and simultaneously collecting OCT depth profiles underneath and around the indentation point. This method offers the opportunity to characterize the mechanical properties of soft materials and simultaneously visualize their deformation profile. The ability to integrate OCT imaging with indentation technology is promising for the non‐invasive and precise characterization of different soft materials.

Paramagnetic Functionalization of Biocompatible Scaffolds for Biomedical Applications: A Perspective

The burst of research papers focused on the tissue engineering and regeneration recorded in the last years is justified by the increased skills in the synthesis of nanostructures able to confer peculiar biological and mechanical features to the matrix where they are dispersed. Inorganic, organic and hybrid nanostructures are proposed in the literature depending on the characteristic that has to be tuned and on the effect that has to be induced. In the field of the inorganic nanoparticles used for decorating the bio-scaffolds, the most recent contributions about the paramagnetic and superparamagnetic nanoparticles use was evaluated in the present contribution. The intrinsic properties of the paramagnetic nanoparticles, the possibility to be triggered by the simple application of an external magnetic field, their biocompatibility and the easiness of the synthetic procedures for obtaining them proposed these nanostructures as ideal candidates for positively enhancing the tissue regeneration. Herein, we divided the discussion into two macro-topics: the use of magnetic nanoparticles in scaffolds used for hard tissue engineering for soft tissue regeneration.

Disentangling the fibrous microenvironment: designer culture models for improved drug discovery

INTRODUCTION

Standard high-throughput screening (HTS) assays rarely identify clinically viable 'hits', likely because cells do not experience physiologically realistic culture conditions. The biophysical nature of the extracellular matrix has emerged as a critical driver of cell function and response and recreating these factors could be critically important in streamlining the drug discovery pipeline.

AREAS COVERED

The authors review recent design strategies to understand and manipulate biophysical features of three-dimensional fibrous tissues. The effects of architectural parameters of the extracellular matrix and their resulting mechanical behaviors are deconstructed; and their individual and combined impact on cell behavior is examined. The authors then illustrate the potential impact of these physical features on designing next-generation platforms to identify drugs effective against breast cancer.

EXPERT OPINION

Progression toward increased culture complexity must be balanced against the demanding technical requirements for high-throughput screening; and strategies to identify the minimal set of microenvironmental parameters needed to recreate disease-relevant responses must be specifically tailored to the disease stage and organ system being studied. Although challenging, this can be achieved through integrative and multidisciplinary technologies that span microfabrication, cell biology, and tissue engineering.

Multi-Functionalized Self-Assembling Peptides as Reproducible 3D Cell Culture Systems Enabling Differentiation and Survival of Various Human Neural Stem Cell Lines

Neural stem cells-based therapies have shown great potential for central nervous system regeneration, with three-dimensional (3D) culture systems representing a key technique for tissue engineering applications, as well as disease modeling and drug screenings. Self-assembling peptides (SAPs), providing biomimetic synthetic micro-environments regulating cellular functionality and tissue repair, constitute a suitable tool for the production of complex tissue-like structures in vitro. However, one of the most important drawbacks in 3D cultures, obtained via animal-derived substrates and serum-rich media, is the reproducibility and tunability of a standardized methodology capable to coax neural differentiation of different human cell lines. In this work we cultured four distinct human neural stem cell (hNSC) lines in 3D synthetic multifunctionalized hydrogel (named HYDROSAP) for up to 6 weeks. Three-dimensional cultures of differentiating hNSCs exhibited a progressive differentiation and maturation over time. All hNSCs-derived neurons in 3D culture system exhibited randomly organized entangled networks with increasing expression of GABAergic and glutamatergic phenotypes and presence of cholinergic ones. Oligodendrocytes formed insulating myelin sheaths positive for myelin basic protein (MBP). In summary, results demonstrated a successfully standardized and reproducible 3D cell culture system for hNSC differentiation and maturation in serum-free conditions useful for future therapies.

Preparation and Evaluation of New Glycopeptides Obtained by Proteolysis from Corn Gluten Meal Followed by Transglutaminase-Induced Glycosylation with Glucosamine

New glycopeptides were generated by proteolysis from corn gluten meal (CGM) followed by transglutaminase (TGase)-induced glycosylation with glucosamine (GlcN). The glycopeptides exhibited desirable antioxidant and intracellular ROS-scavenging properties. The amount of conjugated GlcN quantified by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) was 23.0 g/kg protein. The formed glycopeptides contained both glycosylated and glycation types, as demonstrated by the electrospray ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (ESI-TOF MS/MS). The glycopeptides exhibited scavenging capabilities against free radical diphenylpicrylhydrazyl (DPPH) and hydroxyl radicals by reducing their power. The potential protection of glycopeptides against ethanol-induced injury in LO2 cells was assessed In Vitro based on methyl thiazole tetrazolium (MTT) testing and intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS) scavenging capacity, respectively. Glycopeptide cytoprotection was expressed in a dose-dependent manner, with the glycopeptides exhibiting good solubility ranging from 74.8% to 83.2% throughout a pH range of 2-10. Correspondingly, the glycopeptides showed good emulsifying activity (36.0 m2/g protein), emulsion stability (74.9%), and low surface hydrophobicity (16.3). These results indicate that glycosylation of CGM significantly improved its biological and functional properties. Glycopeptides from CGM could be used as potential antioxidants as well as comprising a functional food ingredient.