Engineering of a Biomimetic Pericyte-Covered 3D Microvascular Network

PLoS One. 2015 Jul 23;10(7):e0133880. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0133880. eCollection 2015.

Abstract

Pericytes enveloping the endothelium play an important role in the physiology and pathology of microvessels, especially in vessel maturation and stabilization. However, our understanding of fundamental pericyte biology is limited by the lack of a robust in vitro model system that allows researchers to evaluate the interactions among multiple cell types in perfusable blood vessels. The present work describes a microfluidic platform that can be used to investigate interactions between pericytes and endothelial cells (ECs) during the sprouting, growth, and maturation steps of neovessel formation. A mixture of ECs and pericytes was attached to the side of a pre-patterned three dimensional fibrin matrix and allowed to sprout across the matrix. The effects of intact coverage and EC maturation by the pericytes on the perfused EC network were confirmed using a confocal microscope. Compared with EC monoculture conditions, EC-pericyte co-cultured vessels showed a significant reduction in diameter, increased numbers of junctions and branches and decreased permeability. In response to biochemical factors, ECs and pericytes in the platform showed the similar features with previous reports from in vivo experiments, thus reflect various pathophysiological conditions of in vivo microvessels. Taken together, these results support the physiological relevancy of our three-dimensional microfluidic culture system but also that the system can be used to screen drug effect on EC-pericyte biology.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Biomimetics
  • Cells, Cultured
  • Endothelial Cells / cytology*
  • Endothelium, Vascular / cytology*
  • Human Umbilical Vein Endothelial Cells
  • Humans
  • Microvessels / cytology*
  • Pericytes / cytology*
  • Tissue Engineering*

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the National Research Foundation funded by the Ministry of Education (NRF-2015R1A2A1A09005662), Seoul National University Hospital Research Fund (03-2014-0260), Seoul National University Research Grant (800-20140542) and Research Grant for Foreign Professors through Seoul National University (SNU) in 2014. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis,decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.