Assembly of the hybrid multicellular spheroids using epithelial cells and hydrogel beads

Abstract

The goal of this article is to regulate the structure of multicellular spheroids. Some epithelial cells including fetal hepatocytes have tendency to form “cyst” structure when they cultured in 3 dimensional aggregates. We added hydrogel beads to the aggregates and obtained “densely-packed” structure with microchannels enabling gas/nutrients exchange. In addition of the structural change, albumin secretion, a typical function of hepatocytes, was also improved. This technique helps to maintain the living cells with functions in multicellular spheroids.