Electrospun Nanocomposites and Stem Cells in Cardiac Tissue Engineering

Stem cell therapy is a leading field of research worldwide given its promising potential for recovery or replacement of tissues and organs, especially for the treatment of cardiovascular pathologies. However, despite this enormous experimental effort and the reported positive results in different models, there is no conclusive demonstration of the mechanisms involved in tissue regeneration associated to adult stem cell treatment. This represents one of the major limitations for the clinical translation of stem cell therapy. A real regenerative medicine approach should consider the importance of the extracellular matrix (ECM) and the strong biological signals that it can provide. Connective tissue atmosphere in which cells are embedded exerts a number of actions affecting cells function and supporting their proliferation and differentiation. Polymeric electrospun matrices are among the most promising ECM-mimetic biomaterials, because of their physical structure closely resembling the fibrous proteins in native ECM. Moreover, electrospun materials can be easily functionalized with bioactive molecules providing localized biochemical stimuli to cells seeded therein. The idea of taking advantage of both stem cells plasticity and biomaterials that actively guide and provide the correct sequence of signals to allow ongoing lineage-specific differentiation is an attractive alternative and may represent a promising answer to the treatment limitations of cardiovascular severe diseases.