Abstract: A contractile smooth muscle cell construct and a method for preparing the smooth muscle cell construct are described. The smooth muscle cell construct is comprised of (i) smooth muscle cells that have been cultured in vitro under conditions to allow the formation of a sheet of smooth muscle cells and (ii) an endogenous fibrous matrix formed by the smooth muscle cells, wherein the smooth muscle cell construct retains the ability to contract in response to vasoactive agonists. The smooth muscle cell construct may be prepared in planar or tubular form and can be used to study or evaluate the contractile responses of smooth muscle cells.

Abstract: A process for culturing and generating a chimeric cell culture, in particular chimeric epithelium, is disclosed. The chimeric epithelium can be used to treat skin trauma such as burn victims. Autologous epithelial grafts have been used on burn patients although this requires that the patient's cells are cultured and expanded in vitro which generally takes four to five weeks. The chimeric epithelium of the present invention is composed of cells that are both autologous and allogeneic to the host. Therefore, the allogeneic cells can be maintained in a cell bank and co-cultured with autologous host cells when needed. This significantly reduces the time required (by up to 50%) for autologous cell expansion and culture prior to grafting. Furthermore, it has been demonstrated that the allogeneic cells are passively eliminated from the graft without rejection of the total graft.