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Composite Crosslinked nanofibrous membranes of chitosan, ethylene glycol diglycidyl ether (EGDE) and polyethylene oxide was successfully prepared with bead free morphology via electrospinning technique followed by heat mediated chemical crosslinking. Architectural stability of nanofiber mat in aqueous medium was achieved by chemical crosslinking of only 1% EGDE, and tensile strength tests revealed that increasing EGDE content has considerably enhance the elastic modulus of nanofibers. The structure, morphology and mechanical properties of nanofibers were characterized by Attenuated Total Reflection-Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and Instron machine, respectively. Skin fibroblasts and endothelial cells showed good attachment, proliferation and viability on crosslinked electrospun membranes. The results indicate a good biocompatibility and non-toxic nature of the resulted membrane.

The final goal of the present study was the development of a 3-D chitosan dressing that would shorten the healing time of skin wounds by stimulating migration, invasion, and proliferation of the relevant cutaneous resident cells. Three-dimensional chitosan nanofibrillar scaffolds produced by electrospinning were compared with evaporated films and freeze-dried sponges for their biological properties. The nanofibrillar structure strongly improved cell adhesion and proliferation in vitro. When implanted in mice, the nanofibrillar scaffold was colonized by mesenchymal cells and blood vessels. Accumulation of collagen fibrils was also observed. In contrast, sponges induced a foreign body granuloma. When used as a dressing covering full-thickness skin wounds in mice, chitosan nanofibrils induced a faster regeneration of both the epidermis and dermis compartments. Altogether our data illustrate the critical importance of the nanofibrillar structure of chitosan devices for their full biocompatibility and demonstrate the significant beneficial effect of chitosan as a wound-healing biomaterial.

Subconfluent normal human keratinocytes exhibit autonomous (autocrine growth factor driven) proliferation and express the specific markers for keratinocyte proliferation K5 (keratin 5) and K14 (keratin 14). Utilizing this model the effects of PKD1 (Protein kinase D1) knockdown on activation of differentiation was studied. siRNA approach was applied to achieve specific knockdown of PKD1 and the mRNA levels of different keratinocyte markers-K14 and PCNA (markers of basal proliferating keratinocytes), involucrin and K10 (early differentiation markers) were analyzed. Treatment of cultured keratinocytes with siRNA for PKD1 resulted in reduction of mRNA levels of PKD1, altered cell phenotype and promotion of keratinocyte differentiation, demonstrated by increased expression of involucrin and K10 mRNAs. No significant changes in K14 mRNA expression levels were detected, but the expression of PCNA mRNA was markedly diminished. This study was the first to show that mRNA expression of PKD1 in subconfluent normal human keratinocytes is very low, the PKD1 mRNA levels were more than 8-fold lower than the same ones in hTert keratinocytes. These findings suggest antidifferentiative role of PKD1 in normal human keratinocytes, contrary to the prodiferentiative role of PKD1 in human hTert keratinocytes. We came to the conclusion that there are differences between transduction pathways involving PKD1 in primary human keratinocyte cultures and these in immortalized hTert keratinocytes.

Cholesterol has been recently suggested to regulate the early steps of keratinocyte differentiation through lipid rafts. In many cell types, depletion of cholesterol activates signaling proteins like epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR), human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2), or extracellular signal-regulated kinase (ERK) known to affect cell differentiation. In this study, we explored the effects of cholesterol depletion on the phenotype of cultured keratinocytes, using a treatment with methyl-beta-cyclodextrin (MbetaCD) to extract cholesterol and a treatment with lovastatin to inhibit cholesterol neosynthesis. Analysis of the expression of differentiation marker genes in early differentiating confluent cultures reveals that cholesterol depletion induces downregulation of keratin 14 (K14) and keratin 10 (K10) and upregulation of involucrin. MbetaCD treatment induces phosphorylation of EGFR, HER2, and ERK, but not HER3. Inhibition of EGFR with PD153035 impairs the MbetaCD-induced phosphorylation of EGFR, HER2, and ERK, but does not impair the alteration of K14, K10, or involucrin gene expression, indicating that other signaling proteins regulate this phenomenon. p38 has been suggested to regulate the expression of involucrin during keratinocyte differentiation. We found that MbetaCD treatment induces a prolonged phosphorylation of p38 in general and p38alpha in particular. An inhibition of p38 with PD169316 impairs the upregulation of involucrin mRNAs by a treatment with MbetaCD, but not by a p38delta-activating TPA treatment, which might suggest that cholesterol depletion alters involucrin gene expression through activation of p38alpha/beta.

Polysaccharide-based nanofibers with a multilayered structure are prepared by combining electrospinning (ESP) and layer-by-layer (LBL) deposition techniques. Charged nanofibers are firstly prepared by electrospinning poly(ε-caprolactone) (PCL) with a block-copolymer bearing carboxylic acid functions. After deprotonation of the acid groups, the layer-by-layer deposition of polyelectrolyte polysaccharides, notably chitosan and hyaluronic acid, is used to coat the electrospun fibers. A multilayered structure is achieved by alternating the deposition of the positively charged chitosan with the deposition of a negatively charged polyelectrolyte. The construction of this multilayered structure is followed by Zeta potential measurements, and confirmed by observation of hollow nanofibers resulting from the dissolution of the PCL core in a selective solvent. These novel polysaccharide-coated PCL fiber mats remarkably combine the mechanical resistance typical of the core material (PCL)-particularly in the hydrated state-with the surface properties of chitosan. The control of the nanofiber structure offered by the electrospinning technology, makes the developed process very promising to precisely design biomaterials for tissue engineering. Preliminary cell culture tests corroborate the potential use of such system in wound healing applications.

For many years, chitosan and its derivatives have been considered to be promising biomaterials for tissue engineering and repair. However, information regarding their biological effect on cell phenotype is usually limited to evaluation of cell proliferation and survival, overlooking proteomic and transcriptomic analysis. This is largely related to the lack of efficient and quantitative procedures for protein and nucleic acid purification from cells cultured on, or inside, chitosan scaffold. Here we describe an ultracentrifugation procedure enabling the simultaneous and quantitative recovery of high quality RNA, DNA and proteins from cells growing in close contact of biomaterial matrices containing chitosan.

In the present study, we have investigated the effect of the chemical CDK-inhibitor CYC202 on E6 and E7-transformed keratinocytes, in which the function of the cellular cell cycle inhibitor p21Cip1 is abrogated by the viral genes. The cyto-toxicity and the inhibition of the cell growth were analysed by MTT assay and analysis of DNA synthesis respectively. The effect on some signalling molecules was tested by Western blot analysis. CYC202 effectively inhibited the proliferation of E6 and E7 keratinocytes in a dose-dependent manner. Treatment with CYC202 strongly increased the activity of p38 MAP kinase. Furthermore, it inhibited ERK1/2 at the highest concentration used and had no effect on the activity of JNK1/2. CYC202 also increased the phosphorylation of HSP27 and decreased the phosphorylation and DNA-binding activity of the transcriptional regulator c-Myc, in correlation with the corresponding upstream kinases p38 MAPK and ERK1/2. Our results provide additional data for the anti-proliferative actions and potency of the chemical CDK-inhibitor CYC202.

CYC202 (R-roscovitine) is a potent cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor, investigated as a potential anti-cancer agent. The knowledge of the action of this pharmacological agent on normal human cells is still limited. In this study, we have explored the effects of the cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor CYC202 on normal human epidermal keratinocytes. The loss of cell viability induced by this compound was strongly dependent on the rate of keratinocyte proliferation. At slightly cytotoxic doses, CYC202 inhibited the proliferation of subconfluent keratinocytes in a dose-dependent manner, and at higher concentrations induction of early apoptosis was observed, evidenced by caspase-3 activation. The signal transduction pathways in subconfluent keratinocytes were altered, as CYC202 increased the phosphorylation of p38 MAP kinase. The activation of this kinase was confirmed by the increased phosphorylation of p38 MAPK substrate, the small heat shock protein HSP27. Prolonged inhibition of highly proliferative cells with CYC202 for 48 and 72 h altered the expression of epidermal differentiation markers. The use of the selective p38 kinase inhibitor PD169316 demonstrated that involucrin mRNA was upregulated by CYC202 via p38 MAPK pathway. These effects were strongly dependent on cell density and were observed only in highly proliferative keratinocytes. We concluded that CYC202 although highly potent against cancer cells inhibits also the proliferation and induces early apoptotic events in autocrine culture of normal human keratinocytes, activates p38 MAP kinase pathway and alters the expression of the epidermal differentiation markers. These results suggest that despite this potency against tumour cells, CYC202 must be used attentively in the clinical practice.

Summary Mouse plasmacytomas are appropriate models to study the biology of human multiple myeloma (MM). Growth of murine interleukin-6 (IL-6)-dependent hybridoma/plasmacytoma lines can be stimulated by bacterial lipopolysaccharides (LPS). However, the molecular mechanisms of this phenomenon are still not elucidated. In this study the in vitro action of bacterial LPS on the mouse IL-6-dependent B9 hybridoma/plasmacytoma cell line and two IL-6-dependent hybridomas was investigated. The involvement of different signal transduction pathways was established using specific kinase inhibitors in proliferation assays and immunoblotting analysis of the kinase activity. Selective mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) kinase inhibitor PD989059 inhibited both IL-6- and LPS-induced B9 cell proliferation. In contrast, in H187 and H188 cells, PD98059 inhibited only LPS-, but not IL-6-stimulated cell growth. The kinetics of MAPK activation in all cell lines showed that phosphorylation of p42 MAPK (encoded as ERK2) but not of p44 MAPK (ERK1), was considerably increased after treatment with LPS. We found that in H187 and H188 hybridomas IL-6 induced proliferation by a different STAT3-dependent mechanism. This study demonstrates the key role of the MAPK pathway in LPS-stimulated growth of mouse IL-6-dependent plasmacytoma cells. These findings suggest the presence of signaling mechanism in MM cells inducible by bacterial mitogens and possibly mediated by Toll-like receptors (TLR) – evolutionarily conserved molecules playing a central role in the microbial recognition and initiation of the cellular innate immune response.