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The Preparation and Performance of a New Polyurethane Vascular Prosthesis

  • Translational Biomedical Research
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Abstract

We investigated the performance of small-caliber polyurethane (PU) small-diameter vascular prosthesis generated using the electrospinning technique. PU was electrospun into small-diameter, small-caliber tubular scaffolds for potential application as vascular grafts. We investigated the effects of electrospinning conditions (solution concentration, mandrel rotation speed) on the microstructure and porosity of the scaffolds for the purpose of preparing scaffolds with optimum microstructures and properties. We evaluated the mechanical properties of the scaffolds by tensile tests and the cytotoxicity of the PU small-diameter, small-caliber PU synthetic vascular graft by the MTT assay. The adhesion of endothelial cells to the PU scaffold was characterized by Hoechst staining and fluorescence microscopy, and we measured endothelial cell proliferation on the PU scaffold by the CCK-8 assay. We analyzed the prosthesis microstructure and endothelial cell morphology using scanning electron microscopy. With increasing PU concentration in the electrospinning solution, the fiber diameter of the vascular graft increased and the porosity decreased. In addition, with increasing electrospinning time, the wall thickness increased and the porosity decreased. We found that regular fiber orientation can be obtained by adjusting the rotation speed of the mandrel. Cell proliferation was not inhibited as the small-caliber PU synthetic vascular grafts showed little cytotoxicity. The endothelial cells had faster adherence to the PU scaffolds than to the PTFE surface during the initial contact. After prolonged cell culture, significantly higher endothelial cell proliferation rate was observed in the PU scaffold groups than the PTFE group. We obtained small-caliber PU vascular grafts with optimal fiber arrangement, excellent mechanical properties, and optimal biocompatibility by optimizing the electrospinning conditions. This study provides in vitro biocompatibility data that is helpful for the clinical application of the PU small-diameter, small-caliber PU vascular grafts.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the National 863 projects of China (2007AA021904), the National Basic Research Program of China (2010CB934700), the Key Induction Project of Science and Technology, Guangdong Province (No: 2011B031300002, 2010B031600055, 2006B35801010, 2005B31201001), the Project-sponsored by SRF for ROCS, SEM (2010-609); and the Doctorate Funding Program for Higher Education, Ministry of Education, China (No: 20050558053).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Vascular Surgery, The First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, 510080, China

    Wei He, Zuojun Hu, Ruiming Liu, Henghui Yin, Jingsong Wang & Shenming Wang

  2. Department of Surgery, GuangZhou Women and Children’s Medical Center, Guangzhou, 510623, China

    Wei He

  3. Division of Nanomaterials and Chemistry, Hefei National Laboratory for Microscopic Physical Sciences, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, 230026, China

    Anwu Xu

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  1. Wei He
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Correspondence to Zuojun Hu or Anwu Xu.

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He, W., Hu, Z., Xu, A. et al. The Preparation and Performance of a New Polyurethane Vascular Prosthesis. Cell Biochem Biophys 66, 855–866 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12013-013-9528-5

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