Human Dental Pulp Stem Cell Adhesion and Viability Studies in Hybrid Hydrogels

The investigation of focal adhesion formation in response to odontogenic culture medium on two-dimensional (2D) glass provides a reference for three-dimensional (3D) cell attachment studies. Hystem-C™ is a commercially available synthetic extracellular matrix (sECM) product comprised of polyethylene glycol diacrylate (PEGDA), hyaluronuic acid (HA) and gelatin (Gn). These components can be manipulated to achieve favorable conditions for cell adhesion and viability in 3D. PEGDA can be substituted with a disulfide bond product, (PEGSSDA), for non-enzymatic cell recovery. The objective of this study was to demonstrate whether hDPSCs embedded in 3D PEGSSDA-HA-Gn hydrogel scaffolds enhance cell viability and adhesion. Both the number and physical size of focal adhesions in hDPSCs increased in response to osteogenic media on 2D glass. HDPSCs embedded in 3D PEGSSDA HA-Gn scaffolds enhanced cell viability. Cell proliferation increased after 14 days in culture. Our investigations to address the optimal ratio of PEGSSDA-HA:Gn suggests that the concentrations of a 1:3 ratio of HA-Gelatin significantly increased hDPSC viablity and adhesion embedded in 3D PEGSSDA-HA-Gn hydrogels.