Roberton VH, Gregory HN, Angkawinitwong U, Mokrane O, Boyd AS, Shipley RJ, Williams GR, Phillips JB. Local delivery of tacrolimus using electrospun poly-ϵ-caprolactone nanofibres suppresses the T-cell response to peripheral nerve allografts.
J Neural Eng 2023;
20. [PMID:
36538818 DOI:
10.1088/1741-2552/acad2a]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/13/2022] [Accepted: 12/20/2022] [Indexed: 12/24/2022]
Abstract
Objective.Repair of nerve gap injuries can be achieved through nerve autografting, but this approach is restricted by limited tissue supply and donor site morbidity. The use of living nerve allografts would provide an abundant tissue source, improving outcomes following peripheral nerve injury. Currently this approach is not used due to the requirement for systemic immunosuppression, to prevent donor-derived cells within the transplanted nerve causing an immune response, which is associated with severe adverse effects. The aim of this study was to develop a method for delivering immunosuppression locally, then to test its effectiveness in reducing the immune response to transplanted tissue in a rat model of nerve allograft repair.Approach.A coaxial electrospinning approach was used to produce poly-ϵ-caprolactone fibre sheets loaded with the immunosuppressant tacrolimus. The material was characterised in terms of structure and tacrolimus release, then testedin vivothrough implantation in a rat sciatic nerve allograft model with immunologically mismatched host and donor tissue.Main results.Following successful drug encapsulation, the fibre sheets showed nanofibrous structure and controlled release of tacrolimus over several weeks. Materials containing tacrolimus (and blank material controls) were implanted around the nerve graft at the time of allograft or autograft repair. The fibre sheets were well tolerated by the animals and tacrolimus release resulted in a significant reduction in lymphocyte infiltration at 3 weeks post-transplantation.Significance.These findings demonstrate proof of concept for a novel nanofibrous biomaterial-based targeted drug delivery strategy for immunosuppression in peripheral nerve allografting.
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