Silk fibroin scaffolds seeded with Wharton’s jelly mesenchymal stem cells enhance re-epithelialization and reduce formation of scar tissue after cutaneous wound healing

Abstract

Background The treatment of extensive and/or chronic skin wounds is a widespread and costly public health problem. Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) have been proposed as a potential cell therapy for inducing wound healing in different clinical settings, alone or in combination with biosynthetic scaffolds. Among them, silk fibroin (SF) seeded with MSCs has been shown to have increased efficacy in skin wound healing experimental models. Methods In this report, we investigated the wound healing effects of electrospun SF scaffolds cellularized with human Wharton’s jelly MSCs (Wj-MSCs-SF) using a murine excisional wound splinting model. Results Immunohistopathological examination after transplant confirmed the presence of infiltrated human fibroblast-like CD90-positive cells in the dermis of the Wj-MSCs-SF-treated group, yielding neoangiogenesis, decreased inflammatory infiltrate and myofibroblast proliferation, less collagen matrix production, and complete epidermal regeneration. Conclusions These findings indicate that Wj-MSCs transplanted in the wound bed on a silk fibroin scaffold contribute to the generation of a well-organized and vascularized granulation tissue, enhance reepithelization of the wound, and reduce the formation of fibrotic scar tissue, highlighting the potential therapeutic effects of Wj-MSC-based tissue engineering approaches to non-healing wound treatment. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1186/s13287-019-1229-6) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Extracellular matrix-based biomaterials as adipose-derived stem cell delivery vehicles in wound healing: a comparative study between a collagen scaffold and two xenografts

“…hADSC delivered by a porcine small intestinal submucosa graft to a rat ventral model [49], hADSC delivered by a decellularised porcine nucleus pulposus device to a rabbit intervertebral disc degeneration model [50], rat bone marrow stem cells delivered by a porcine decellularised meniscus materials to a full-thickness rat meniscus defect model [51]). The gradual loss in fluorescent signal observed in all conditions could be also attributed to the loss of scar tissue after 2 weeks, as has been suggested before in the same model [52,53].…”

Regenerative potential of Wharton's jelly‐derived mesenchymal stem cells: A new horizon of stem cell therapy

“…WJ‐MSCs administrated on a decellularized amniotic membrane scaffold into the wound bed, showed reduced scar formation with hair growth (Sabapathy, Sundaram, Mankuzhy, & Kumar, 2014). Similarly, the combination of WJ‐MSCs and silk fibroin scaffold exhibited significant enhancement in wound re‐epithelization and reduced fibrotic scar formation (Millan‐Rivero et al, 2019). Besides, the association of human WJ‐MSCs and poly (vinyl alcohol) hydrogel membrane resulted in the promotion of wound healing in two dogs with chronic skin wounds where the standard treatments failed (Ribeiro et al, 2014).…”

Two Sides of Electrospun Fiber in Promoting and Inhibiting Biomedical Processes

“…In a report, the healing outcome of electrospun SF mats acellularized with human Wharton's jelly MSCs (Wj-MSCs-SF) was investigated using a murine excisional wound splinting model (Figure 11D). [252] The membrane inhibited scar formation, highlighting its potential in wound treatment. Additionally, a 3D, proteinbased, artificial skin developed using an electrospun nanofibrous silk fibroin (ESF) and a decellularized human amniotic membrane (AM) was fabricated using electrospinning.…”