Figure 6.

Hybrid ECM‐ALG hydrogels combine tunable composition and stiffness. A) Schematic representation of dECM solubilization and combination with ALG hydrogel to produce dECM‐ALG hybrid hydrogels via internal ionic crosslinking with Ca²⁺, followed by in situ stiffening via external ionic crosslinking with Ba²⁺. Created with BioRender.com. B) Multivariate separation of adECM‐ALG and ndECM‐ALG confocal Raman spectra data sets via PCA. (Data represents n > 20 spectra for each sample). C) CLSM images of fluorescently labelled dECM‐ALG hydrogels (dECM in magenta, ALG in cyan). D) Total ECM and FN content in ndECM‐ALG and adECM‐ALG hydrogels. E) CLSM images of MCF10A cells cultured in adECM‐ALG hydrogels after 1 and 7 days of culture (dECM in magenta, F‐actin in green, similar results were obtained in ndECM‐ALG hydrogels). F) Metabolic activity (resazurin assay) and acini size quantification for MCF10A cells cultured in dECM‐ALG hydrogels for 1 and 7 days, Data is presented as mean ± standard deviation. Statistical significance: *p < 0.05, **p < 0.01,***p < 0.001, ****p<0.0001.