Fabrication of Cell-Adhesion Surface and Capillary Vessel Model by Photolithography

We have been developing scaffolds of three-dimensional (3D) synthetic vascular prosthesis in tailor-made. Human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) attached on the inner surface of the scaffold have anticoagulant effects. Asperity structures of the inner surface are important to cell adhesion. It is important to quantify the inner surface asperity condition of the scaffold by observing HUVECs behavior and morphology. For this purpose, we recreated the inner surface profile of the scaffold on a poly(dimethilsiloxane) (PDMS) substrate by microfabrication. We made semiround convex patterns of resist that had 8 mum in diameter and 5 mum high using photolithography, and the concave pattern on the PDMS substrate by printing. We observed HUVECs adhering to the PDMS substrate having concave pattern on it surface. The distribution density of the concaves of the tested pattern is 1600 /mm² or 40,000 in a 25 mm² area. In addition, we fabricated a capillary vessel model by photolithography, creating a branched capillary tube model that had 13 mum in diameter. We confirmed that the capillary vessel model had no leakage using a methylene blue solution flow in the channel.