Peripheral nerve regeneration is a clinical challenge that tremendously
affected the patients’ quality of life. Recently, anisotropic
microtopology has shown promise in treating peripheral nerve
regeneration. However, the systematically investigation of how
micropatterning influence Schwann cells (SCs), including morphology,
biofunction and gene expression etc, has never been investigated.
Herein, we fabricated the chitosan
micropatterning with four different ridge/groove (RG) and subsequently
cultured the SCs on those samples. As a result, the SCs showed obvious
orientationally growth to micropatterning and 30/30 μm size showed the
best regulation effect. And in the meantime, 30/30 μm size did not
affect the DNA synthesis phase of SC cells (G2 and S phase) and
significantly down-regulated both the relative protein level of N-
cadherin and β-catenin from SCs. More importantly, the anisotropic
micropatterning could significantly up-regulate the expression of
several key genes of SCs related to neuronal plasticity and axon
regeneration (smad6), cytoskeleton development (β-actin) and myelination
(MPZ). Overall, the results demonstrated that the anisotropic chitosan
micropatterning with 30/30 μm size can regulate SCs’ orientation well
with a tendency to myelination; and the systemic evaluation provide
mechanical understanding, which acts as important references for future
design of anisotropic biomaterials for peripheral nerve regeneration.