Abstract:

BACKGROUND: The main scaffold for vaginal tissue engineering study, polyglycolic acid, has rapid degradation and other defects. Acellular natural scaffold material, in particular small intestinal submucosa, is becoming a hot spot of tissue engineering research.
OBJECTIVE: To explore the possibility of using porcine small intestinal submucosa acellular matrix as a cell carrier in vaginal tissue engineering.
METHODS: The vaginal smooth muscle tissues were separated from New Zealand female rabbits, and cultured by tissue explant + collagen digestion methods in vitro, then passaged and incubated into self-made porcine small intestinal submucosa matrix as a seed cell. Morphology, growth and proliferation of the cells were monitored under the inverted microscope. The cell-matrix complex was harvested at 1, 2, 3, 4 weeks for histological examination.
RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: ①The vaginal smooth muscle cells were successfully cultured in vitro. The cells were fusiform and aggregated in Petri dish, forming “peak-valley” structure. ② The submucosa acellular matrix was white, semitransparent and tough. No cell component could be seen by hematoxylin-eosin staining. ③ Specimens of vaginal smooth muscle cell-intestinal submucosa were stained by hematoxylin-eosin, cell components were increasing gradually and grew from surface to deep site under light microscope. ④ Specimens of vaginal smooth muscle cell-intestinal submucosa were stained by monoclonal antibody of anti-rabbit smooth muscle a-actin by immunohistochemistry. The a-actin positive cells can be seen. Results preliminarily prove that porcine intestinal submucosa matrix can be used as smooth muscle cells carrier.