Micro- and Nanoengineering of the Cell Surface

Chapter 10

Cell Microencapsulation for Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine

Jian Du and Kevin J. Yarema,    Department of Biomedical Engineering and the Translational Tissue Engineering Center, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA

Cell encapsulation was originally envisioned decades ago as a way to protect cells from the host’s immune system to facilitate transplantation therapies and now serves additional roles such as localization of cells to a desired site in the body. In recent years, the pace of progress has increased as novel techniques for fabricating microcapsules have dovetailed with a growing number of biocompatible natural and synthetic polymers suitable for supporting cell growth, proliferation, and secretion ...