Preparation, characterization and evaluation of chitosan macroporous for potential application in skin tissue engineering.

In this paper, chitosan macroporous membrane was developed by a selective dissolution technology using silica particles (SiO(2)) as the porogen agent. Regarding of the weight ratio of silica particle/chitosan (1:2, 1:1 and 2:1; w/w), a series of chitosan membranes were developed. The initial SiO(2) content in the formulation was greatly influenced on the morphology of chitosan membrane. As the initial SiO(2)/chitosan weight ratio was lower than 1:2, the developed chitosan membrane was dense absence of any porous structure. Meanwhile, the developed chitosan membranes were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), porosity, mechanical property, water adsorption as well as in vitro degradation. In vitro cytotoxicity study showed that the extractions of all developed chitosan membranes were non-cytotoxic against L-929 cells after 24 h of culturing. L-929 cells cultured with chitosan macroporous membrane (S3) revealed that the cells were flattened with effective spreading after 24 h and 48 h of culturing. All these results indicated that the developed chitosan macroporous membrane might have potential application in skin tissue engineering.