Description
Marine organisms and materials exhibit interesting properties for their
use in biomedical applications, following biomimetic approaches [1,2].
For instance, the white seabass (Lates Calcarifer) scales exhibit a very
interesting pattern, which inspire their use as a guiding platform for
cellular growth, in a tissue regeneration approach. Moreover, fish scales
are composed of hydroxyapatite and type I collagen fibrils, equivalent
to the materials that one can find in human bone, as thus their use in
bone tissue engineering is envisaged. The main goal of the present
work was the assessment of fish scales, combining intrinsic features
such as patterns, hydroxyapatite and collagen in different means, as
cell culture supports aiming at guiding cell growth and extracellular
matrix deposition and mineralization. In this sense, human adipose
derived stem cells (hASCs) were cultured onto seabass scales, under
osteogenic and non-osteogenic conditions. Fish scales supported cell
adhesion and cytoskeleton organization defined by the surface patterning.
Moreover, hASCs were able to proliferate along the time of culture
and to differentiate towards the osteogenic lineage depositing and mineralizing
the characteristic extracellular matrix. This work constitutes
the first step to demonstrate the value of the intrinsic properties of seabass
scales for exploitation in the biomedical field and in particular for
bone tissue engineering.
; Afonso, David Losa de Areia 
