• pancreatic cancer
• three-dimensional scaffold
• tissue engineering

The present research activity is aimed at the development of 3D culture of pancreatic
cancer cells in microstructured polymer matrices in order to gain insights in the
regulation of pancreatic cancer cell proliferation as well as in the view of developing an
in vitro model for the evaluation of novel anticancer drugs.
The research activity will be performed under a multidisciplinary approach and all the
described objectives will be part of three chapters that constitute the body of this work:
1) Three-dimensional polyelectrolyte complexes hydrogels based on chitosan and
poly(γ-glutamic acid): preparation and physical-chemical characterization
2) Biocompatibility assessment of polyelectrolyte complexes hydrogels
3)Modeling of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma in vitro with three-dimensional
microstructured polyelectrolyte complexes hydrogels