Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Chapter 21
FOR LIVER TISSUE ENGINEERING
Chong-Su Cho,
a
Hu-Lin Jiang,
a
Takashi Hoshiba,
b
and Toshihiro Akaike
c*
a
Departmentof Agricultural Biotechnology, Seoul NationalUniversity,
Seoul151-921,Korea
b
BiomaterialsCenter,National InstituteforMaterials Science,
Tsukuba 305-0044,Japan
c
DepartmentofBiomolecular Engineering,Tokyo Instituteof Technology,
Yokohama226-8502,Japan
*takaike@bio.titech.ac.jp
Recently, the development of biomaterials for liver tissue engi-
neering has focused on the design of biomimetic scaffolds that
can serve as a temporary mechanical support su
cient to with-
stand
invivo
forcesandmaintainapotentialspacefortissuedevel-
opment through molecular recognition. Molecular recognition of
scaffolds by hepatocytes has been achieved by chemical modifi-
cation of biomaterials with galactose moiety as a specific ligand
that can incur specific interactions with asialoglycoprotein recep-
tors (ASGPR) on the hepatocytes. The biomimetic scaffolds mimic
many roles of the extracellular matrix (ECM) in liver tissues, such
as attachment, proliferation, migration, differentiation, and sur-
vival of hepatocytes. This chapter discusses the mechanism of
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