Fabrication and assessment of chondroitin sulfate-modified collagen nanofibers for small-diameter vascular tissue engineering applications

•Chondroitin sulfate modified collagen (ChS-COL) nanofibers were fabricated.•ChS-COL nanofibers facilitated endothelial cell growth and phenotypic expression.•Thrombocyte activation could be alleviated on the ChS-COL nanofibers.•The ChS-COL nanofibers promoted the realization of endothelialization in vivo. Chondroitin sulfate (ChS) has shown promising results in promoting cell proliferation and antithrombogenic activity. To engineered develop a dual-function vascular scaffold with antithrombosis and endothelialization, ChS was tethered to collagen to accelerate the growth of endothelial cells and prevent platelet activation. First, ChS was used to conjugate with collagen to generate glycosylated products (ChS-COL) via reductive amination. Then, the fabricated ChS-COL conjugates were electrospun into nanofibers and their morphologies and physicochemical characteristics, cell-scaffold responses and platelet behaviors upon ChS-COL nanofibers were comprehensively characterized to evaluate their potential use for small-diameter vascular tissue-engineered scaffolds. The experimental results demonstrated that the ChS modified collagen electrospun nanofibers were stimulatory of endothelial cell behavior, alleviated thrombocyte activation and maintained an antithrombotic effect in vivo in 10-day post-transplantation. The ChS-COL scaffolds encouraged rapid endothelialization, thus probably ensuring the antithrombotic function in long-term implantation, suggesting their promise for small-diameter vascular tissue engineering applications.