Fractal characteristics of the microvascular network: A useful index to assess vascularization level of porous silk fibroin biomaterial

Abstract The neovascularization of biomaterials for tissue engineering is not only related to growth of capillaries but also involves appropriate hierarchy distribution of the microvessels. In this study, we proposed hierarchy distribution contrast method which can assess vascular transport capacity, in order to examine the hierarchy distribution of the neovessels during vascularization of the porous silk fibroin biomaterials implanted into rats and its evolution. The results showed that the fractal characteristics appeared toward the end of the vascularization stages, and the structure of the microvascular network after 3 weeks of implantation was similar to the fractal microvascular tree with bifurcation exponent x = 3 and fractal dimension D = 1.46, which became a sign of maturation of the regenerative vasculature. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Biomed Mater Res Part A: 105A: 2276–2290, 2017.