Design and fabrication of injectable microcarriers composed of acellular cartilage matrix and chitosan

Cartilage is an avascular tissue with limited self-repair ability. Since the methods for treatment of cartilage defects have not been effective, new therapies based on tissue engineering are considered over the recent years. In this study, human cartilage tissue was decellularized and porous injectable microcarriers (MCs) composed of acellular extracellular matrix (ECM) of cartilage tissue and chitosan (CS), with different ECM weight ratios, were fabricated by electrospraying technique to be used in the treatment of articular cartilage defects. Various properties of ECM/CS MCs such as microstructure, mechanical strength, water uptake behaviour, and biodegradability rate were investigated. MCs with 1% ECM and 2% CS show appropriate characteristics in terms of pore size, density, porosity, and mechanical properties. MTT cytotoxicity assays performed on chondrocyte cells cultured on ECM/CS MCs with various amounts of ECM showed that the sample with 1% ECM content had the greatest cell attachment. Overall, it can be concluded that the prepared MCs with 1% ECM could be a potential candidate to be used in cartilage tissue engineering applications.