title: Tissue engineered epithelial cell sheets for the creation of a bioartificial trachea.
abstract: To successfully engineer a bioartificial tracheal replacement, it is believed that the regeneration of a functional epithelial lining is a key requirement. In the present study, rabbit tracheal epithelial cells were cultured on temperature-responsive culture dishes, under normal culture conditions at 37 degrees C. By simple temperature reduction to 20 degrees C, the cultured epithelial cells were noninvasively harvested as intact sheets, without the use of any proteolytic enzymes. Support Dacron grafts that had been subcutaneously implanted for 4 weeks to allow for host tissue and vessel infiltration were then opened, and the tracheal epithelial cell sheets were transplanted to the luminal surface without sutures. These fabricated constructs were then used as tracheal replacements, in a rabbit model. Four weeks after transplantation, results showed that the tracheal grafts were covered by a mature, pseudostratified columnar epithelium. In contrast, control constructs that did not receive cell sheet transplantation demonstrated only a thin, immature epithelium at the center of the replacement graft. These results therefore demonstrate that these tracheal epithelial cell sheets can create an epithelial lining on the luminal surface of a bioartificial trachea.
authors.affiliation: The Department of Surgery I, Tokyo Women's Medical University, Tokyo, Japan.
authors.forename: Masato
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kanzaki
authors.forename: Masayuki
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Yamato
authors.forename: Hideyuki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Hatakeyama
authors.forename: Chinatsu
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Kohno
authors.forename: Joseph
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.forename: Terumasa
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Umemoto
authors.forename: Akihiko
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Kikuchi
authors.forename: Teruo
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Okano
authors.forename: Takamasa
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Onuki
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D021522:Bioartificial Organs; D002478:Cells, Cultured; D004847:Epithelial Cells / Q000166:cytology; D018919:Neovascularization, Physiologic; D019736:Prostheses and Implants; D011817:Rabbits; D013499:Surface Properties; D023822:Tissue Engineering; D014132:Trachea / Q000166:cytology / Q000601:surgery