Synergistic effect of κ-carrageenan and gelatin blends towards adipose tissue engineering

The current paper focuses on the functionalization of kappa-carrageenan and gelatin as extracellular matrix polysaccharide and protein mimic respectively to produce hydrogel films for adipose tissue engineering. More specifically, kappa-carrageenan as well as gelatin have been functionalized with methacrylate and methacrylamide moieties respectively to enable subsequent UV-induced crosslinking in the presence of a photo-initiator. The gel fraction, the mass swelling ratio and the mechanical properties of both the one-component hydrogels and the protein/polysaccharide blends have been evaluated. The mechanical and swelling properties of the blends could be tuned by varying the hydrogel composition as well as the crosslinking method applied. The in vitro bio-compatibility assays indicated a significantly higher cell viability of adipose tissue-derived mesenchymal stem cells seeded onto the blends as compared to the one-component hydrogels. The results show that the blends of gelatin and kappa-carrageenan clearly outperform the one-component hydrogels in terms of adipose tissue engineering potential.