Time-Dependent Effect of Encapsulating Alginate Hydrogel on Neurogenic Potential

Objective: due to the restricted potential of neural stem cells for regeneration of centralnervous system (cns) after injury, providing an alternative source for neural stem cells isessential. adipose derived stem cells (adscs) are multipotent cells with properties suitablefor tissue engineering. in addition, alginate hydrogel is a biocompatible polysaccharidepolymer that has been used to encapsulate many types of cells. the aim of this study wasto assess the proliferation rate and level of expression of neural markers; nestin, glialfibrillary acidic protein (gfap) and microtubule-associated protein 2 (map2) in encapsulatedhuman adscs (hadscs) 10 and14 days after neural induction.materials and methods: in this experimental study, adscs isolated from human werecultured in neural induction media and seeded into alginate hydrogel. the rate of proliferationand differentiation of encapsulated cells were evaluated by 3-[4, 5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl]-2, 5-diphenyl tetrazolium bromide (mtt) assay, immunocytoflourescent and realtimereverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (rt-pcr) analyzes 10 and 14 daysafter induction.results: the rate of proliferation of encapsulated cells was not significantly changed withtime passage. the expression of nestin and gfap significantly decreased on day 14relative to day 10 (p < 0.001) but map2 expression was increased.conclusion: alginate hydrogel can promote the neural differentiation of encapsulatedhadscs with time passage.