Fabrication of Vascular Patch from Porcine Pericardium

Abstract

Pericardial tissues have been studied and applied in biomedicine, especially in the cardiovascular field as vascular grafts for their advantages of availability, excellent biocompatibility, and low rate of infection. Porcine pericardial tissues with similar adequate biological and mechanical properties have also recently been in great interest for cardiovascular transplantation. Our study focused on the fabrication of vascular patch from acellular porcine pericardium. Porcine pericardium was collected and decellularized, which were then undergone the treatment in glutaraldehyde for sterilization and cross-linking. The results demonstrated that glutaraldehyde presented a great effectiveness in sterilization and increase the tensile strength of pericardium, which was also confirmed by the degradation resistance in plasma and collagenase solution. MTT assay confirmed liquid extracts from the glutaraldehyde treated pericardium caused no cytotoxicity towards human fibroblasts. Additionally, SEM image indicated that the treated pericardium can support an appropriate attachment of human endothelial progenitor cells. Taken together, our results demonstrated the glutaraldehyde treated pericardium to be a suitable patch material for further application in cardiovascular field as vascular grafts.