Patient-Specific Blood Vessel Scaffold for Regenerative Medicine

In this research, we propose a method to construct an artificial blood vessel scaffold with patient-specific complex 3-dimensional shape and biocompatible porous polymer membrane adapted for cell cultivation, by introducing salt leaching technique into a fabrication technique for patient-specific 3D blood vessel model proposed by authors. In this method, a membranous PVA (polyvinyl alcohol) structure of desired 3-dimensional blood vessel shape was fabricated based on CT data. And the PVA structure was dip coated with polymer solution made by dissolving the Caprolactone (3wt%) and NaCl particle (27wt%) into chloroform (organic solvent), Finally, the NaCl particle and the membranous PVA structure were both eluted from the structure by dissolving these materials under water, and finally a patient-specific blood vessel scaffold with desired 3D vascular shape was constructed. Presented scaffold has the mechanical compliance similar to human blood vessel and provides porous polymer structure appropriate for cell cultivation.