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    Melt Electrowriting of Scaffolds with a Porosity Gradient to Mimic the Matrix Structure of the Human Trabecular Meshwork
    (New York : Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, 2022) Włodarczyk-Biegun, Małgorzata K.; Villiou, Maria; Koch, Marcus; Muth, Christina; Wang, Peixi; Ott, Jenna; del Campo, Aranzazu
    The permeability of the Human Trabecular Meshwork (HTM) regulates eye pressure via a porosity gradient across its thickness modulated by stacked layers of matrix fibrils and cells. Changes in HTM porosity are associated with increases in intraocular pressure and the progress of diseases like glaucoma. Engineered HTMs could help to understand the structure-function relation in natural tissues, and lead to new regenerative solutions. Here, melt electrowriting (MEW) is explored as a biofabrication technique to produce fibrillar, porous scaffolds that mimic the multilayer, gradient structure of native HTM. Poly(caprolactone) constructs with a height of 125-500 μm and fiber diameters of 10-12 μm are printed. Scaffolds with a tensile modulus between 5.6 and 13 MPa, and a static compression modulus in the range of 6-360 kPa are obtained by varying the scaffolds design, i.e., density and orientation of the fibers and number of stacked layers. Primary HTM cells attach to the scaffolds, proliferate, and form a confluent layer within 8-14 days, depending on the scaffold design. High cell viability and cell morphology close to that in the native tissue are observed. The present work demonstrates the utility of MEW to reconstruct complex morphological features of natural tissues.
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    Impact of process temperature and organic loading rate on cellulolytic/hydrolytic biofilm microbiomes during biomethanation of ryegrass silage revealed by genome-centered metagenomics and metatranscriptomics
    (London : BioMed Central, 2020) Maus, Irena; Klocke, Michael; Derenkó, Jaqueline; Stolze, Yvonne; Beckstette, Michael; Jost, Carsten; Wibberg, Daniel; Blom, Jochen; Henke, Christian; Willenbücher, Katharina; Rumming, Madis; Rademacher, Antje; Pühler, Alfred; Sczyrba, Alexander; Schlüter, Andreas
    Background: Anaerobic digestion (AD) of protein-rich grass silage was performed in experimental two-stage two-phase biogas reactor systems at low vs. increased organic loading rates (OLRs) under mesophilic (37 °C) and thermophilic (55 °C) temperatures. To follow the adaptive response of the biomass-attached cellulolytic/hydrolytic biofilms at increasing ammonium/ammonia contents, genome-centered metagenomics and transcriptional profiling based on metagenome assembled genomes (MAGs) were conducted. Results: In total, 78 bacterial and archaeal MAGs representing the most abundant members of the communities, and featuring defined quality criteria were selected and characterized in detail. Determination of MAG abundances under the tested conditions by mapping of the obtained metagenome sequence reads to the MAGs revealed that MAG abundance profiles were mainly shaped by the temperature but also by the OLR. However, the OLR effect was more pronounced for the mesophilic systems as compared to the thermophilic ones. In contrast, metatranscriptome mapping to MAGs subsequently normalized to MAG abundances showed that under thermophilic conditions, MAGs respond to increased OLRs by shifting their transcriptional activities mainly without adjusting their proliferation rates. This is a clear difference compared to the behavior of the microbiome under mesophilic conditions. Here, the response to increased OLRs involved adjusting of proliferation rates and corresponding transcriptional activities. The analysis led to the identification of MAGs positively responding to increased OLRs. The most outstanding MAGs in this regard, obviously well adapted to higher OLRs and/or associated conditions, were assigned to the order Clostridiales (Acetivibrio sp.) for the mesophilic biofilm and the orders Bacteroidales (Prevotella sp. and an unknown species), Lachnospirales (Herbinix sp. and Kineothrix sp.) and Clostridiales (Clostridium sp.) for the thermophilic biofilm. Genome-based metabolic reconstruction and transcriptional profiling revealed that positively responding MAGs mainly are involved in hydrolysis of grass silage, acidogenesis and/or acetogenesis. Conclusions: An integrated-omics approach enabled the identification of new AD biofilm keystone species featuring outstanding performance under stress conditions such as increased OLRs. Genome-based knowledge on the metabolic potential and transcriptional activity of responsive microbiome members will contribute to the development of improved microbiological AD management strategies for biomethanation of renewable biomass. © 2020 The Author(s).