Use of autologous tissue engineered skin to treat porcine full-thickness skin defects.
OBJECTIVE
To explore a feasible method to repair full-thickness skin defects utilizing tissue engineered techniques.


METHODS
The Changfeng hybrid swines were used and the skin specimens were cut from the posterior limb girdle region, from which the keratinocytes and fibroblasts were isolated and harvested by trypsin, EDTA, and type II collagenase. The cells were seeded in Petri dishes for primary culture. When the cells were in logarithmic growth phase, they were treated with trypsin to separate them from the floor of the tissue culture dishes. A biodegradable material, Pluronic F-127, was prefabricated and mixed with these cells, and then the cell-Pluronic compounds were seeded evenly into a polyglycolic acid (PGA). Then the constructs were replanted to the autologous animals to repair the full-thickness skin defects. Histology and immunohistochemistry of the neotissue were observed in 1, 2, 4, and 8 postoperative weeks.


RESULTS
The cell-Pluronic F-127-PGA compounds repaired autologous full-thickness skin defects 1 week after implantation. Histologically, the tissue engineered skin was similar to the normal skin with stratified epidermis overlying a moderately thick collageneous dermis. Three of the structural proteins in the epidermal basement membrane zone, type IV collagen, laminin, and type VII collagen were detected using immunohistochemical methods.


CONCLUSIONS
By studying the histology and immunohistochemistry of the neotissue, the bioengineered skin graft holds great promise for improving healing of the skin defects.
Cai
Xia
X
Department of Plastic Reconstructive Surgery, Shanghai Ninth People's Hospital, The Key Laboratory of Tissue Engineering, Shanghai Second Medical University, Shanghai 200011, China. caixia72@163.com
Cao
Yi-lin
YL
Cui
Lei
L
Liu
Wei
W
Guan
Wen-xiang
WX
D000818:Animals; D004195:Disease Models, Animal; D004817:Epidermis / Q000473:pathology; D012867:Skin / Q000276:immunology / Q000293:injuries* / Q000473:pathology; D016038:Skin Transplantation / Q000379:methods*; D013552:Swine; D023822:Tissue Engineering / Q000379:methods; D014182:Transplantation, Autologous; D019737:Transplants; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000601:surgery*