Previous culture techniques are often ineffective for providing appropriate conditions to cells grown in vitro for efficient growth and maturation. However, the advent of microfluidic chips allows us to manipulate various factors from co-culturing cells to inducing shear stress and biochemical gradient. The above have all been effectively applied to stem cell engineering, allowing dynamic interactions with other cells and, as a result, acquisition of a more mature state. The introduction of both synthetic and natural hydrogels into the chip provides more precise in vivo-like biophysical and biochemical cues to cells, enabling better recapitulation of the in vivo-like physiological behaviors and further maturation of stem cells even to the scale of organoids. This review addresses fundamental roles of microfluidic chips and hydrogels and how hydrogel-integrated chip systems provide breakthroughs in advanced stem cell engineering.

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用于高级干细胞工程的水凝胶集成微流控系统

先前的培养技术通常不能有效地为体外生长的细胞提供合适的条件，以使其有效生长和成熟。然而，微流控芯片的出现使我们能够操纵各种因素，从共培养细胞到诱导剪切应力和生化梯度。以上已有效地应用于干细胞工程，允许与其他细胞动态相互作用，从而获得更成熟的状态。将合成水凝胶和天然水凝胶引入芯片可为细胞提供更精确的体内样生物物理和生化线索，从而使体内更好地重现样的生理行为以及干细胞的进一步成熟，甚至达到类器官的规模。这篇综述阐述了微流体芯片和水凝胶的基本作用，以及水凝胶集成芯片系统如何在高级干细胞工程中提供突破。