Total auricular reconstruction using a cellularized thermoformed scaffold with septal chondrocytes in an in vivo model to develop mature ear cartilage

Most recent studies still rely on animal-derived cells and fail to demonstrate the long-term maintenance of the chondrogenic phenotype. In this study, we developed an off-the-shelf poly(lactide-b-ethylene glycol) (PLA-PEG) scaffold combined with clinical-grade alginate (Alg) and cellularized with human nasal chondrocytes for auricular cartilage engineering.

Cellularized constructs were evaluated using histological and immunofluorescence analyses to assess extracellular matrix production and quality. In parallel, constructs retrieved after 12 weeks of in vivo implantation were mechanically characterized using a UniVert CellScale testing system to determine variations in compressive strength. Finally, the chondrogenic maturation of the new tissue was evaluated through bulk RNA transcriptomic profiling.