2004   Volume No 7- pages 1-11

Title: Tissue-engineered human asthmatic bronchial equivalents

Authors: Jean-Sébastien Paquette, Véronique Moulin, Pierrot Tremblay, Vincent Bernier, Michel Boutet, Michel Laviolette, François A. Auger, Louis-Philippe Boulet and Francine Goulet

Address: Laboratoire de Génie Tissulaire/LOEX, Hôpital de l'Enfant-Jésus du CHA and
Unité de Recherche en Pneumologie, Hôpital Laval, Québec, Canada.

E-mail: chgfgo@hermes.ulaval.ca

Key Words: human bronchial equivalents, asthma, bioengineering

Publication date: March 10th 2004

Abstract: The isolation of human bronchial epithelial (HBEC) and fibroblastic cells (HBFC) from biopsies of asthmatic and non-asthmatic volunteers provided unique cellular materials to be used for the production of bioengineered bronchial equivalents (BE) in vitro. The HBEC are grown on a mesenchymal layer seeded with HBFC and the BE can be maintained for at least 15 days in culture. Under the BE culture conditions established previously, HBEC undergo differentiation into ciliated and goblet cells, within a pseudostratified organization comparable to human bronchi. We published previously the results from histologic and functional analyses of such BE produced exclusively using non-asthmatic HBEC and HBFC. We report here the comparative analyses of BE produced with non-asthmatic and asthmatic living HBEC and HBFC (naBE and aBE, respectively). Our data indicated that all asthmatic HBEC populations grown on a mesenchymal layer, containing non-asthmatic HBFC, slowly reached a confluent state but then detached from the matrix upon culture time. These BE appear to be very good models to study the mechanisms involved in asthma in vitro.

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