Low fouling electrospun scaffolds with clicked bioactive peptides for specific cell attachment

While electrospun fibers are of interest as scaffolds for tissue engineering applications, nonspecific surface interactions such as protein adsorption often prevent researchers from controlling the exact interactions between cells and the underlying material. In this study we prepared electrospun fibers from a polystyrene-based macroinitiator, which were then grafted with polymer brushes using surface-initiated atom transfer radical polymerization (SI-ATRP). These brush coatings incorporated a trimethylsilyl-protected PEG-alkyne monomer, allowing azide functional molecules to be covalently attached, while simultaneously reducing nonspecific protein adsorption on the fibers. Cells were able to attach and spread on fibrous substrates functionalized with a pendant RGD-containing peptide, while spreading was significantly reduced on nonfunctionalized fibers and those with the equivalent RGE control peptide. This effect was observed both in the presence and absence of serum in the culture media, indicating that protein adsorption on the fibers was minimal and cell adhesion within the fibrous scaffold was mediated almost entirely through the cell-adhesive RGD-containing peptide.