Mesenchymal stem/stromal cells (MSC) have become one of the more promising research areas in the past decade, representing progress in regenerative medicine, especially for common musculoskeletal diseases, since MSCs can differentiate into osteoblasts under appropriate conditions. One of the more interesting substrates for MSC deposition are electrospun nanofibers, which, through the selection of suitable polymers and the formation of composites, provide a large specific surface area for cell adhesion, while at the same time being biocompatible and mimicking the appropriate in vivo microenvironment. Such a composite is also a nanofiber network of polycaprolactone (PCL) and gelatin (GEL), which we prepared in this master’s thesis and subsequently monitored its influence on the osteogenic differentiation capacity of MSCs. The solvent used for the production of nanofibers was a mixture of acetic acid (AA) and formic acid (FA), which proved to be most suitable at a ratio of 3:1. We varied the ratios of PCL/GEL and observed that they influenced the thickness of the resulting fibers and the pore size. To further improve the stability of nanofibers in aqueous media, we crosslinked them with glutaraldehyde (GTA) and monitored swelling gravimetrically. The effect of such prepared nanofibers was evaluated by monitoring their influence on the osteogenic differentiation capacity of MSCs, which we determined through microscopic examination of histochemical staining with alizarin red S dye, as well as by measuring the absorbance of the extracted dye. We found that PCL/GEL composite nanofibers enhanced the osteogenic differentiation of MSCs compared to the control without nanofibers and the control without osteogenic medium. These results provide the basis for further testing of such nanofibers to improve the osteogenic potential of MSCs for bone tissue regeneration.
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