Delivery of TGFβ3 from Magnetically Responsive Coaxial Fibers Reduces Spinal Cord Astrocyte Reactivity In Vitro (Adv. Biology 10/2024)

Drug Delivery

Spinal cord injury (SCI) is a devastating condition that severely impacts patient quality of life, and there are no available treatments that restore lost function. Biomaterials can provide local, sustained release of therapeutics, but drug-releasing biomaterials do not address variability in injury severity. To tune delivery to a unique injury, Ryan J. Gilbert and co-workers developed a fibrous scaffold that can be stimulated with a magnetic field to alter the release rate of a growth factor. The authors found that sustained release of the growth factor resulted in a greater reduction of spinal cord astrocyte reactivity compared to bolus delivery in vitro. The astrocytes treated with the drug-releasing scaffold supported sensory neuron growth in coculture, shown in the flourescence image. Article number 2300531 provides a foundation for developing biomaterials capable of tunable growth factor release in response to externally applied magnetic fields for SCI treatment.