Multiscale engineered human skeletal muscles with perfusable vasculature and microvascular network recapitulating the fluid compartments

Abstract

Creating a vasculature in engineered human skeletal muscle tissues (ehSMTs) enables us to create thick tissues, increase cell survival in implantation, provide models of blood-organ barriers for drug testing, and enhance muscle differentiation through paracrine signaling. Here, contractile ehSMTs with a central perfusable vascular channel and microvascular networks growing from this central vasculature into the surrounding skeletal muscle tissue were newly demonstrated. Because coculturing muscle cells and endothelial cells requires incompatible media, we recapitulated thein vivoextracellular fluid compartments between blood plasma and interstitial fluid by creating anin vitroperfusable vasculature running through skeletal muscle tissue with a physiologic cell density. By using this model, we constructed large vascularized ehSMTs and showed the potential to be utilized for drug testing platforms. Also, we found that coculturing with two separate media from an early stage of muscle differentiation led to increased contractile force, thicker myotubes, and improved muscle differentiation.

Keywords: angiogenesis; engineered skeletal muscle tissues; fluid compartments; microenvironment; myogenesis; scalable tissue model; vascularization.