The high functionalization of temperature-responsive culture dishes for establishing advanced cell sheet engineering

Our laboratory developed cell sheet engineering, which has been applied to regenerative medicine. However, the applications are restricted to the transplants of single-, double-, and triple-layered cell sheets, because of the poor supplies of nutrients and oxygen. To fabricate thicker and dense tissues in vitro, multi-layered cell sheets need to have capillary networks. Additionally, individual tissues found in animal bodies have individual specific micropatterns of cells for expressing their specific functions and characteristics. Therefore, our laboratory has developed various kinds of micropatterned surfaces which could align cells in the shape of micropatterns. In this review, we summarize and discuss patterned surfaces that allow us to perform the high functionalization of temperature-responsive culture dishes for establishing advanced cell sheet engineering.