Self-Assembly of RGD-Functionalized Recombinant Spider Silk Protein into Microspheres in Physiological Buffer and in the Presence of Hyaluronic AcidShow others and affiliations
2023 (English)In: ACS Applied Bio Materials, E-ISSN 2576-6422, Vol. 6, no 9, p. 3696-3705Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]
Biomaterials made of self-assembling protein building blocks are widely explored for biomedical applications, for example, as drug carriers, tissue engineering scaffolds, and functionalized coatings. It has previously been shown that a recombinant spider silk protein functionalized with a cell binding motif from fibronectin, FN-4RepCT (FN-silk), self-assembles into fibrillar structures at interfaces, i.e., membranes, fibers, or foams at liquid/air interfaces, and fibrillar coatings at liquid/solid interfaces. Recently, we observed that FN-silk also assembles into microspheres in the bulk of a physiological buffer (PBS) solution. Herein, we investigate the self-assembly process of FN-silk into microspheres in the bulk and how its progression is affected by the presence of hyaluronic acid (HA), both in solution and in a cross-linked HA hydrogel. Moreover, we characterize the size, morphology, mesostructure, and protein secondary structure of the FN-silk microspheres prepared in PBS and HA. Finally, we examine how the FN-silk microspheres can be used to mediate cell adhesion and spreading of human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs) during cell culture. These investigations contribute to our fundamental understanding of the self-assembly of silk protein into materials and demonstrate the use of silk microspheres as additives for cell culture applications.
Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
American Chemical Society (ACS) , 2023. Vol. 6, no 9, p. 3696-3705
Keywords [en]
cell culture, confocal microscopy, cryo-electron microscopy, fluorescence microscopy, hyaluronic acid, recombinant spider silk, self-assembly, silk microspheres
National Category
Biochemistry Molecular Biology
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:kth:diva-349824DOI: 10.1021/acsabm.3c00373ISI: 001048127800001PubMedID: 37579070Scopus ID: 2-s2.0-85168992000OAI: oai:DiVA.org:kth-349824DiVA, id: diva2:1881645
Note
QC 20240703
2024-07-032024-07-032025-02-20Bibliographically approved