An Initial Evaluation of Gellan Gum as a Material for Tissue Engineering Applications

Smith, Alan M., Shelton, Richard M., Perrie, Yvonne and Harris, Jonathan J. (2007) An Initial Evaluation of Gellan Gum as a Material for Tissue Engineering Applications. Journal of Biomaterials Applications, 22 (3). pp. 241-254. ISSN 0885-3282

Abstract

Alpha-modified minimum essential medium (alphaMEM) has been found to cross-link a 1% gellan gum solution, resulting in the formation of a self-supporting hydrogel in 1:1 and 5:1 ratios of polysaccharide: alphaMEM. Rheological data from temperature sweeps confirm that in addition to orders of magnitude differences in G' between 1% gellan and 1% gellan with alphaMEM, there is also a 20°C increase in the temperature at which the onset of gelation takes place when alphaMEM is present. Frequency sweeps confirm the formation of a true gel; mechanical spectra for mixtures of gellan and alphaMEM clearly demonstrate G' to be independent of frequency. It is possible to immobilize cells within a three-dimensional (3D) gellan matrix that remain viable for up to 21 days in culture by adding a suspension of rat bone marrow cells (rBMC) in alphaMEM to 1% gellan solution. This extremely simple approach to cell immobilization within 3D constructs, made possible by the fact that gellan solutions cross-link in the presence of millimolar concentrations of cations, poses a very low risk to a cell population immobilized within a gellan matrix and thus indicates the potential of gellan for use as a tissue engineering scaffold.

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