Fabricating thermoresponsive hydrogels from decellularized tissues is a trending and promising approach to develop novel biomaterials for tissue engineering and therapeutic purposes. There are differences in the characteristics of the produced hydrogels related to the source tissue as well as the decellularization and solubilization protocols used. Detailed characterization of the hydrogels will support the efforts to optimize their application as biomaterials for tissue engineering and therapeutics. Here, we describe an optimized method for fabricating an in situ thermoresponsive hydrogel from decellularized porcine cornea extracellular matrix (COMatrix), and provide a detailed characterization of its structure, thermoresponsive rheological behavior (heat-induced sol-gel transition), as well as exploring its protein composition using proteomics. COMatrix forms a transparent gel (10-min time to gelation) after in situ curing with heat, characterized by alteration in light absorbance and rheological indexes. The rheological characterization of heat-formed COMatrix gel shows similar behavior to common biomaterials utilized in tissue engineering. The fibrillar structure of COMatrix gel was observed by scanning electron microscopy showing that the density of fibers attenuates in lower concentrations. Mass spectrometry-based proteomic analysis revealed that COMatrix hydrogel is rich in proteins with known regenerative properties such as lumican, keratocan, and laminins in addition to structural collagen proteins (Data is available via ProteomeXchange with identifier PXD020606). COMatrix hydrogel is a naturally driven biomaterial with favorable biomechanical properties and protein content with potential application as a therapeutic biomaterial in ocular regeneration and tissue engineering.

中文翻译：

---

角膜热响应水凝胶的制备、流变学和成分表征

从脱细胞组织制造热响应水凝胶是开发用于组织工程和治疗目的的新型生物材料的趋势和有前途的方法。与源组织相关的生产水凝胶的特性以及所使用的脱细胞和溶解方案存在差异。水凝胶的详细表征将支持优化其作为组织工程和治疗生物材料应用的努力。在这里，我们描述了一种优化的原位制造方法来自去细胞猪角膜细胞外基质 (COMatrix) 的热响应水凝胶，并提供了对其结构、热响应流变行为（热诱导的溶胶-凝胶转变）的详细表征，以及使用蛋白质组学探索其蛋白质组成。COMatrix 原位形成透明凝胶（凝胶化时间为 10 分钟）加热固化，其特征在于光吸收和流变指数的变化。热成型 COMatrix 凝胶的流变学特性与组织工程中使用的常见生物材料表现出相似的行为。通过扫描电子显微镜观察COMatrix凝胶的纤维状结构表明纤维的密度在较低浓度下衰减。基于质谱的蛋白质组学分析表明，COMatrix 水凝胶除了结构胶原蛋白外，还富含具有已知再生特性的蛋白质，例如 lumican、keratocan 和层粘连蛋白（数据可通过 ProteomeXchange 获得，标识符为 PXD020606）。