Peptide nanofiber substrates for long-term culturing of primary neurons.

The culturing of primary neurons represents a central pillar of neuroscience research. Primary neurons are derived directly from brain tissue and recapitulate key aspects of neuronal development in an in vitro setting. Unlike neural stem cells, primary neurons do not divide, thus initial attachment of cells to a suitable substrate is critical. Commonly used poly-lysine substrates can suffer from batch variability owing to their polymeric nature. Herein we report the use of chemically well-defined, self-assembling tetrapeptides as substrates for primary neuronal culture. These water soluble peptides assemble into fibres which facilitate adhesion and development of primary neurons, their long-term survival (>40 days), synaptic maturation and electrical activity. Furthermore, these substrates are permissive towards neuronal transfection and transduction, which coupled with their uniformity and reproducible nature, make them suitable for a wide variety of applications in neuroscience.