Oxidation and RGD Modification Affect the Early Neural Differentiation of Murine Embryonic Stem Cells Cultured in Core-Shell Alginate Hydrogel Microcapsules

Directed neural differentiation of embryonic stem cells (ESCs) has been studied extensively to improve the treatment of neurodegenerative disorders. This can be done through stromal-cell derived inducing activity (SDIA), by culturing ESCs directly on top of a layer of feeder stromal cells. However, the stem cells usually become mixed with the feeder cells during the differentiation process, making it difficult to obtain a pure population of the differentiated cells for further use. To address this issue, a non-planar microfluidic device is used here to encapsulate murine ESCs (mESCs) in the 3D liquid core of microcapsules with an alginate hydrogel shell of different sizes for early neural differentiation through SDIA, by culturing mESC-laden microcapsules over a feeder layer of PA6 cells. Furthermore, the alginate hydrogel shell of the microcapsules is modified via oxidation or RGD peptide conjugation to examine the mechanical and chemical effects on neural differentiation of the encapsulated mESC aggregates. A higher expression of Nestin is observed in the aggregates encapsulated in small (similar to 300 mu m) microcapsules and cultured over the PA6 cell feeder layer. Furthermore, the modification of the alginate with RGD facilitates early neurite extension within the microcapsules. This study demonstrates that the presence of the RGD peptide, the SDIA effect of the PA6 cells, and the absence of leukemia inhibition factor from the medium can lead to the early differentiation of mESCs with extensive neurites within the 3D microenvironment of the small microcapsules. This is the first study to investigate the effects of cell adhesion and degradation of the encapsulation materials for directed neural differentiation of mESCs. The simple modifications (i.e., oxidation and RGD incorporation) of the miniaturized 3D environment for improved early neural differentiation of mESCs may potentially enhance further downstream differentiation of the mESCs into more specialized neurons for therapeutic use and drug screening.