Int J Oral Sci. 2016 Nov 4. doi: 10.1038/ijos.2016.33. [Epub ahead of print]

Dental pulp stem cells express tendon markers under mechanical loading and are a potential cell source for tissue engineering of tendon-like tissue.

Chen YY^1,2, He ST³, Yan FH^4,5, Zhou PF², Luo K², Zhang YD⁶, Xiao Y^5,7, Lin MK².

Abstract

Postnatal mesenchymal stem cells have the capacity to differentiate into multiple cell lineages. This study explored the possibility of dental pulp stem cells (DPSCs) for potential application in tendon tissue engineering. The expression of tendon-related markers such as scleraxis, tenascin-C, tenomodulin, eye absent homologue 2, collagens I and VI was detected in dental pulp tissue. Interestingly, under mechanical stimulation, these tendon-related markers were significantly enhanced when DPSCs were seeded in aligned polyglycolic acid (PGA) fibre scaffolds. Furthermore, mature tendon-like tissue was formed after transplantation of DPSC-PGA constructs under mechanical loading conditions in a mouse model. This study demonstrates that DPSCs could be a potential stem cell source for tissue engineering of tendon-like tissue.International Journal of Oral Science advance online publication, 4 November 2016; doi:10.1038/ijos.2016.33.