Each tissue of human
body is characterized by unique biochemical composition, architecture
and mechanical properties. The main objective of tissue engineering
is creating artificial constructs that would replicate human tissues
both structurally and functionally. It is a very complicated task
because of immense complexity of living tissues and only limited
potentiality of lifeless materials. Scaffolds that are based on
natural and synthetic polymers have been developed. Synthetic
polymers are more mechanically stable and precise stru , whereas
natural polymers are more biocompatible and biofunctional.
Protein-based polymers are promising candidates for tissue
engineering due to their biocompatibility and ease of
functionalization. Unfortunately, it is next to impossible to
precisely control microarchitecture
of scaffolds fabricated from protein-based polymers which impedes
their usage for creating implants that have anatomical relevance to
native tissues and organs. Consequently, till date very few
engineered constructs crafted from protein-based polymers could reach
human clinical trial level.

Our
goal was to create protein polymer
based material that would be amenable to photo-triggered covalent
crosslinking in order to create
highly controlled micropatterns. 10
X. Gao, Y. Zhou, G. Ma, S. Shi, D. Yang, F. Lu, J. Nie, A
water-soluble photocrosslinkable chitosan derivative prepared by
Michael-addition reaction as a precursor for injectable hydrogel,
Carbohydr. Polym. 79 (2010) 507-512. 11 H. Aubin, J. W. Nichol, C.
B. Hutson, H. Bae, A. L. Sieminski, D. M. Cropek, P. Akhyari, A.
Khademhosseini, Directed 3D cell alignment and elongation in
microengineered hydrogels. Biomaterials 31 (2010) 6941-6951.

Silk fibroin (SF)
hydrogels are currently receiving lots of interests for tissue
engineering because of their versatility, desirable
physico-chemical characteristics, biocompatibility, and ease of their
transformation from solution to gel by different stimuli Rockwood
DN, Preda RC, Yücel T, Wang X, Lovett ML, Kaplan DL. Materials
fabrication from Bombyx mori silk fibroin. Nature protocols.
2011;6:1612-31. .
Based
on silk fibroin, we have created new, biocompatible material with
superior mechanical properties and controllable microarchitecture.
Now
chemistry and AFM from Bagrov and others
By
photolythography we have manufactured 2 different FBMA- based
hydrogel scaffolds with defined microstrucure. Using photolitography,
micropatters with resolution up mto 5 micron were created.
Therefore, our technology allowed us to control not only
macrostructure, but also microstructure of scaffolds.

To assess
biocompatibility of FBMA-based polymers we investigated growth and
development of mice fibroblasts lineXXX on their surface. Fibroblasts
are preferred in tissue engineering because they support structure of
the implant by secreting ECM components and ing tissue regeneration
by promoting growth of blood vessels and angiogenesis. Both MTT and
cell viability tests showed that fibroblasts were able to attach and
proliferate on both types of FBMA-based films. Fibroblasts
viability and proliferation rate on FBMA-based scaffolds were high
and not significantly different from their viability and
proliferation rate on unmodified fibroin. CLSM images revealed that
cell density on scaffolds increased within 7 days (figxx) and cell
morphology became substantially flat and well-spread, especially on
films films produced with HFIP FigXX. Therefore, both FBMA-based
polymers are biocompatible and support growth and division of mice
fibroblasts.