Significance
Extensive hair loss continues to be difficult to treat and causes significant patient morbidity. Hair follicle (HF) tissue engineering may seem to be a way out. However, the absence of the in-vivo microenvironment fails to regenerate mature hairs. This study systematically described a biomimetic co-culture approach to generate better quality human dermal papilla cell aggregates (hDPAs) with improved hair inductive properties, which can be further used for HF tissue engineering. The hDPC microenvironment was reprogrammed through the controllable formation of self-assembled organoids in Matrigel and the tri-culture with hair matrix cells and dermal sheath cup cells. This work indicates that the production of hDPAs could be readily scaled, in theory for large-scale assays, analyses, or therapeutic applications.
Statement of significance
Extensive hair loss continues to be difficult to treat and causes significant patient morbidity. Hair follicle (HF) tissue engineering may seem to be a way out. However, the absence of the in-vivo microenvironment fails to regenerate mature hairs. This study systematically described a biomimetic co-culture approach to generate better quality human dermal papilla cell aggregates (hDPAs) with improved hair inductive properties, which can be further used for HF tissue engineering. The hDPC microenvironment was reprogrammed through the controllable formation of self-assembled organoids in Matrigel and the tri-culture with hair matrix cells and dermal sheath cup cells. This work indicates that the production of hDPAs could be readily scaled, in theory for large-scale assays, analyses, or therapeutic applications.