Eukaryotic cells as sources of biomaterials and living materials

• Autor(a) principal: Lagarto, Matilde Rodrigues
• Data de Publicação: 2022
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10773/37373
• topic: Living materials; Cell-derived biomaterials; Metabolic glycoengineering

With the global increase of the average life expectancy, an aged and fragile population arises alongside, being healthcare improvement the top priority. In this sense, Tissue Engineering (TE) and Regenerative Medicine (RM) fields have experienced exponential growth since these scientific areas hold promise to improve healthcare and patient’s wellbeing. In this context, eukaryotic cells have been explored as key elements in TERM strategies for healthcare owing to their relevance in promoting tissue repair and restoring homeostasis. This master thesis addresses cells from two distinct perspectives considering a production dimension: cells as producers of biomaterials and cells as precursors of living materials. The cell-derived biomaterials such as extracellular matrix, cell membrane and secretome are disclosed for targeted approaches that require the tailoring of specific features regarding architecture and bioinstruction via intercellular communication. Evolving in terms of biological complexity, the formation of living materials aims to harmoniously gather all such features in a hierarchic assembly that amplifies biological responses and has tissue-specific functional properties. Leveraging on this, the convergence of developing universal techniques to create living materials that also operate as biomaterial-producing units may give rise to improved biofunctionalities. Considering the latter, eukaryotic cells’ maturation in different conditions and their processing to generate a living material with multiscale bioarchitecture is presented here. Through this technology, advances towards manufacturing increasingly physiomimetic living materials are foreseen in the near future.