BIOENCAPSULATION 

Minerva Biotecnologica 2000 December;12(4):309-17

Copyright © 2000 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

lingua: Inglese

Encapsulation of Sertoli’s cells for in vivo transplantation

Luca G. ¹, Calafiore R. ², Basta G. ², Ricci M. ¹, Rossi C. ¹, Nastruzzi C. ¹

¹ Department of Medicinal Chemistry and Pharmaceutics, School of Medicine, University of Perugia, Perugia, Italy; ² Department Internal Medicine, Section of Internal Medicine and Endocrine and Metabolic Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Perugia, Perugia, Italy

The ­present ­paper ­describes the ­most ­recent advanc­es in the encap­su­la­tion of ­Sertoli’s ­cells (SC) for in ­vivo trans­plan­ta­tion. ­Recent ­reports ­have dem­on­strat­ed ­that ­Sertoli’s ­cells may ­improve ­both in ­vitro and in ­vivo func­tion­al com­pe­tence of dif­fer­ent ­cells; in particular, SC improve, in vitro, the functional competence of pancreatic islats (I) and, in ­vivo, pro­long ­islet allo­graft sur­vi­val in ani­mal mod­el of dia­betes mel­lit­us. We ­have devel­oped (a) a meth­od for ­high ­yield sep­ar­a­tion of pur­i­fied SC ­from ­rodents and por­cine pre-puber­tal ­testes and (b) dif­fer­ent meth­ods for the encap­su­la­tion of SC in algi­nate micro­cap­sules, name­ly, “Medi­um ­Size” (MSM) and “Coher­ent” Micro­cap­sules (CM). ­Both pro­ce­dures are rel­a­tive­ly sim­ple and con­sist­e of a lim­it­ed num­ber of ­steps. In ­order to ­achieve com­plete bio­com­pat­ibil­ity, indis­pens­able for mam­mal­ian ­cells, the encap­su­la­tion pro­ce­dures ­were con­duct­ed at ­room tem­per­a­ture ­under phys­io­log­ic pH and tonic­ity.