Cryopreservation of red blood cells (RBCs) has been studied as a typical example of cryobiology methodology. To date, a mature and long-term cryopreservation process for RBCs has been developed, which has the weakness of complicated procedures due to high concentrations of glycerol (Gly). Therefore, it is still a research focus to find a new method for cryopreservation of RBCs to reduce the concentrations of cryoprotectants (CPAs). In this study, alginate hydrogels, which have been widely used in preservation research, were selected because of their advantages such as lower cost, cytocompatibility, and crosslinking occurring under mild conditions. With a variety of CPA solutions, the RBC recovery with the cryopreservation of RBCs and RBC-laden hydrogel microfibers was compared in different situations. It was found that hydrogel microfiber encapsulation enhances cryopreservation of human RBCs with low concentrations of CPAs. And Gly can be removed by washing directly with a 0.9% sodium chloride solution. This study validated the feasibility of cryopreservation of RBC-laden hydrogel microfibers. It may provide a new and evolving direction for reducing the concentrations of CPAs used in the preservation of RBCs.

中文翻译：

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水凝胶超细纤维封装增强了甘油含量低的人红细胞的冷冻保存。

红细胞（RBC）的冷冻保存已被研究为冷冻生物学方法的典型例子。迄今为止，已经开发了用于RBC的成熟且长期的冷冻保存方法，由于高浓度的甘油（Gly），其具有操作复杂的缺点。因此，寻找一种新的冷冻保存红细胞以降低冷冻保护剂（CPA）浓度的方法仍然是研究的重点。在这项研究中，选择了藻酸盐水凝胶（已广泛用于保存研究），因为它们具有成本低，细胞相容性好和在温和条件下发生交联的优点。对于各种CPA解决方案，在不同情况下比较了冷冻保存RBC和负载RBC的水凝胶微纤维对RBC的回收率。发现水凝胶微纤维包封增强了具有低浓度CPA的人RBC的冷冻保存。通过直接用0.9％氯化钠溶液洗涤可以除去Gly。这项研究证实了冷冻保存RBC的水凝胶微纤维的可行性。它可能为减少用于保存红细胞的CPA浓度提供新的发展方向。