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Promoting Adipocyte Survival In A Tissue Engineered Model Of Fat Grafting Using Embryonically Reset Adult Endothelial Cell Chaperones
Abby Chopoorian Fuchsman, BA1, Riley Mayne, BS
2, Sophia Salingaros, BA
2, Kate Manley, BS
3, Xue Dong, MD PhD
2, Jason A. Spector, MD
2.
1Rutgers New Jersey Medical School, Newark, NJ, USA,
2Weill Cornell Medicine, New York, NY, USA,
3University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA.
PURPOSE Fat grafting is commonly used for breast reconstruction and body contouring, but often suffers from poor volume retention, in part due to insufficient vascularization. We have previously shown that reset vascular endothelial cells (R-VECs), which are human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) transduced to express the embryonic vasculogenic transcription factor ETV2, promote adipocyte survival in vitro. Herein we use HUVECs and R-VECs to investigate the impact of endothelial cell chaperones in varying densities on adipocyte survival in an in vitro tissue engineered model of fat transfer.
METHODS Primary adipocytes isolated from patient adipose tissue were cultured in 7 mg/mL collagen constructs alone or with HUVECs or RVECs at "low" and "high" densities (250,000 and 2.5 million cells/mL collagen, respectively) and fixed after 0, 4, and 7 days. Adipocyte viability was assessed using perilipin immunofluorescent staining.
RESULTS "Low" and "high" density R-VEC and "low" density HUVEC co-cultures exhibited significantly higher adipocyte viability compared to monoculture after 4 and 7 days. There was a suggestive increase in adipocyte viability in high density compared to low density R-VEC co-culture.
CONCLUSIONS Endothelial cell chaperones improved adipocyte retention in an engineered
in vitro model of fat transfer, showing promise as an off-the-shelf adjunct to improve fat grafting. There were no differences between R-VEC and HUVEC groups, suggesting that their chaperone effects on adipocyte survival are not proportional to vasculogenic capacity.
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