IUVSTA 15th International Vacuum Congress (IVC-15), AVS 48th International Symposium (AVS-48), 11th International Conference on Solid Surfaces (ICSS-11)
    Biomaterials Thursday Sessions
       Session BI-ThA

Paper BI-ThA6
Stretching and Fibroblast Growth on GRGDSP-Peptide Modified Silicone Membranes

Thursday, November 1, 2001, 3:40 pm, Room 102

Session: Cell-Surface Interaction
Presenter: S.S. Lateef, University of Illinois at Chicago
Authors: L. Hanley, University of Illinois at Chicago
S.S. Lateef, University of Illinois at Chicago
S. Boateng, University of Illinois at Chicago
T.J. Hartman, University of Illinois at Chicago
C. Crot, University of Illinois at Chicago
B. Russell, University of Illinois at Chicago
Correspondent: Click to Email
Diseased, hypertrophic human heart muscle cells (cardiac myocytes) are found to increase in length and volume due to excessive mechanical load. We are developing an entirely new cell culture in silicone elastomer that will mimic the in-vivo cell phenotype to address such questions in cardiac mechanobiology. We chemically modify silicone membranes to improve their ability to culture cardiac myocytes under dynamic stretching, thereby allowing study of mechanical effects. It is well known from studies of cellular attachment that several intrinsic proteins found on the cell surface will recognize and attach to the GRGDSP peptide sequence. We plasma oxidize the surface of the silicone membrane; functionalize it with amine via reaction with 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane; attach a sulfo-maleimide cross-linker; then attach a 15-residue peptide, acetyl-CGGEGYGEGRGDSPG-amide, to the cross-linker through its terminal thiol group. The membranes are characterized by x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, spectochemical analysis, and radiolabelling. Stretching studies with radiolabelled cysteine (in place of peptide) show that the modified layer survives on the surface for 48 hours of stretching in cell culture media. The GRGDSP peptide bound silicone shows enhanced binding of rat fibroblasts when compared with amine-functionalized and unmodified silicone surfaces.