New methods of EB/Calcein-AM and MTS/PMS were proposed to measure the microencapsulated mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) viability,and compared with the trypan blue and MTT staining methods for exploring a suitable microencapsulated cell viability assay method.All the four kinds of methods,the trypan blue,EB/Calcein-AM,MTT,and MTS,were used to measure the cell viability of sodium alginate polylysine alginate (APA) microencapsulated MSCs.The results show that the conventional trypan blue and MTT detection methods are not suitable,while the EB/Calcein-AM and MTS are effective for measuring the vicbility of microencapsulated MSCs.