Microchannel Porous Hydroxyapatite Scaffold Promotes Osteogenic Differentiation by Altering the Expression of miRNAs

Abstract Hydroxyapatite is a commonly used scaffold material for bone tissue engineering. However, the osteogenic mechanism of hydroxyapatite scaffolds remains unclear. Recently, we have prepared a hydroxyapatite scaffolds with microchannels and porous structures (HAG) which have good osteogenic effects in vitro and in vivo. In present study, we explained the mechanism of HAG scaffolds promoted the osteogenic differentiation from the perspective of miRNA differential expression. We used microarray assays to analyze the expression profiles of miRNAs from the osteogenic differentiation of hPMSCs with or without HAG; 16 miRNAs were upregulated and 29 miRNAs were downregulated between the two types of cells. And overexpression the differential miRNAs could promote the osteogenic differentiation of hPMSCs. Additionally, gene ontology analysis, pathway analysis, and miRNA-mRNA-network built were performed to reveal that the differentially expressed miRNAs participate in multiple biological processes, including cell metabolic, cell junction, cell development, differentiation, and signal transduction, among others. Furthermore, we found that these differentially expressed miRNAs connect osteogenic differentiation to processes such as axon guidance, MAPK, and TGF-beta signaling pathway. This is the first study to identify and characterize differentiational miRNAs derived from HAG-hPMSC cells.