Fig. 2

Morphology of the primary epithelial cells, fibroblasts, and skin equivalent. a Seeded epithelial cells showing their characteristic “pavement stone” morphology; b Fibroblasts reaching confluence 15 days after the plating of the dermal cells; c Typical air-liquid interface system composed by a PRP-leukocyte depleted scaffold in a 24 mm trans-well. The skin model was assembled through a co-culture of epithelial cells and fibroblasts-seeded in the PRP-leukocyte depleted scaffold; d Confluent epithelial cells growing in multilayers on the surface of the scaffold; e Confluent fibroblasts embedded into the scaffold; f Transversal section of the skin equivalent showing the presence of different epithelial cells organized into the different layers of the skin. Nuclei of the epithelial cells are stained in violet. The image also shows the presence of the fibroblasts (nuclei stained in violet) embedded in the PRP-leukocyte depleted scaffold stained in pink reassembling the extracellular matrix of the skin. Scale bar = 100 μm