Short Poster Lecture
Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) are the main cause of death globally. Typically, CVDs are attributed to the inability of cardiomyocytes to regenerate, and proliferate cells. The most prominent cure is cardiac transplantation, which is cumbersome, and hindered by the scarcity of cardiac donors. Therefore, new techniques are being developed to regenerate, and proliferate heart cells to regain their functionality. Biomimetic, standalone elastomeric 3D templates with uniaxially oriented helically coiled structures (HCS) were fabricated by wet-electrospinning and collection on a rotating collector. These stretchable, compliant, and porous artificial templates are well suited for cardiac cell adhesion, differentiation, and proliferation. The effect of physical parameters of HCS on the performance characteristics of the templates was investigated. The results show that fiber and coil diameter of HCS strongly influence the compliance, porosity, and extensibility of the biomimetic 3D template. It is envisioned that these HCS based templates with high surface area per unit volume, high compliance, and high interconnected porosity will provide improved cardiac cell proliferation allowing for their cyclic motion (contraction/retraction).
