Advanced Materials

Graphical Abstract A collagen-I-based hydrogel system that mimics physiologically relevant tissue architectures is developed, called collagen islands. These island hydrogels are facile to generate by modulating the shearing frequency and have tunable architectures and mechanical properties. It is found that the island architecture is able to modulate osteogenic commitment in mesenchymal stem cells and mesodermal differentiation in pluripotent stem cells.