Microfibre fabrication supports cell growth and could regenerate tissue

Iowa State University researchers have created a new way to design and fabricate microfibres that support cell growth and could eventually reconnect nerves and regenerate damaged tissues.

"Neural stem cells on our polymer fibres could survive, differentiate and grow," said Nastaran Hashemi, an Iowa State assistant professor of mechanical engineering and leader of an Iowa State team producing microfibers with the help of microfluidics, the study of fluids moving through channels just a millionth of a meter wide.

"These new fibrous platforms could also be used for cell alignment which is important in applications such as guiding nerve cell growth, engineered neurobiological systems and regenerating blood vessels, tendons and muscle tissue," Hashemi said.

The research was supported with a grant from the US Office of Naval Research, an organisation that wanted to learn more about traumatic brain injury.

"We are interested in understanding how shock waves created by blows to the head can create microbubbles that collapse near the nerve cells, or neurons in the brain, and damage them," Hashemi said in a statement.