Table 3.
Applications of scaffold-free tissue engineering.
| Application | Culture Method | Application Method/Results |
|---|---|---|
| Therapeutics | Autologous skeletal muscle tissue sheet | Transplantation to the patient epicardium, improved cardiac disease symptoms [139] |
| Suspension culture of cartilaginous spheroids from human iPSC | Implantation into tibial fractures in nude mice, limited induction of bone remodeling [140] | |
| Suspension culture of primary porcine hepatocyte spheroids | Implantation into extracorporeal device, improved outcomes in a porcine acute liver failure model [141] | |
| Bio-printed trachea from suspension culture of primary rat chondrocyte, mesenchymal stem cells, and lung epithelial cells | Transplantation into rats show vasculogenesis and chondrogenesis [142] | |
| Disease Modeling | Suspension culture of non-small-cell lung cancer spheroids | Genome-wide CRISPR high-throughput drug screen against 3D cancer growth [143] |
| Hanging-drop culture of stable and tumor-derived, murine cells to form mammary spheroids | Studying neoplastic progression in spheroids with high consistency and reproducibility [144] | |
| Suspension spheroid co-culture of HepaRG and primary-derived hepatic stellate cells | Identification of acetaminophen as driver of stellate activation in liver fibrosis [145] | |
| Suspension culture-based differentiation of iPSCs into 3D neuro-spheres from Alzheimer’s disease patients | Drug screen of spheroids showed a patient-specific response to a specific drug [146] | |
| Developmental & Stem cell studies | Suspension culture of human hPSC, differentiated to cardiomyocytes | Characterized the effects of spheroid culture and cell density on cardiomyocyte differentiation [147] |
| “Lungosphere” suspension culture from primary-derived murine lung epithelial cells | Characterization of lung epithelial stem cells, validation of novel assay to separate lung epithelial stem cells [148] |