Decellularization of fish skin for tissue engineering applications

• Main Author: Lau, Chau Sang
• Other Authors: Teoh Swee Hin
• Format: Theses and Dissertations
• Language: English
• Published: 2019
• Subjects: Engineering::Bioengineering; Science::Medicine::Tissue engineering
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/100060; http://hdl.handle.net/10220/49976
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Collagen is a popular biomaterial in tissue engineering due to its natural abundance and excellent biocompatibility. However, most commercial collagen comes from porcine and bovine sources, which have a risk of transmissible diseases and are unsuitable for patients with religious restrictions. Fish-derived collagen scaffolds are gaining attention due to their low immunological risk and the abundance of collagen in fish waste such as skin and scales. Among the various fish types, Nile Tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus), a tropical freshwater fish native to Africa, is lauded as a promising source of collagen due to its rapid growth rate and high protein content. Tilapia collagen scaffolds can be formed by reconstituting collagen extracted from tilapia skin, or by removing cells from tilapia skin in a process known as decellularization. While reconstituted tilapia collagen had been studied in tissue engineering, there was very little information on the decellularization of tilapia tissues. This revealed a great potential and novelty for decellularized tilapia skin to be used as a tissue engineering scaffold and to address the growing demand for tissue constructs. In this thesis, we demonstrated that (1) tilapia skin could be decellularized using appropriate treatments to yield an acellular scaffold, (2) the decellularized tilapia skin (DTS) possessed favourable physical and biological properties, and (3) the DTS was suitable as a scaffold in tissue regeneration. The findings in this thesis and subsequent works would help to meet the increasing need for tissue constructs from patients who are unable to take mammalian products, and transform fish waste into useful and valuable biomaterials.