Novel Electrospun Nanocomposites With Controllable Compositional Gradient and Degradation Kinetics for Vascular Tissue Engineering

Vascular graft materials currently used in the medical field are often made from bioinert synthetic materials such as polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE). The high long-term failure rate of these materials in the replacement of small vessels is known to be associated with the lack of proper signaling events by PTFE to vascular cells causing adverse hemodynamic, inflammatory or coagulatory conditions. Tissue engineering approaches emerge as a promising method to obtain replacement vessels. These approaches are often based on homogeneous constructs or multilayer of homogeneous constructs are yet to demonstrate capability of controlling the integration of tissue engineering construct in vivo better for long-term patency. Therefore, constant and pressing is the demand for scaffold constructs which can provide not only proper mechanical support, but also precise molecular cues and degradation kinetics to facilitate the proper remodeling and integration process in vivo over the time for long-term patency. To this end, we have developed and demonstrated a novel double-electrospinning apparatus to obtain interpenetrating networks of nanofibers made from different polymers in a tailored proportion with heterogeneous gradient patterns of fiber materials and functional biomolecules.