In tissue engineering fields, recent interest has been focused on stem cell therapy to replace or repair damaged or worn-out tissues due to congenital abnormalities, disease, or injury. In particular, the repair of articular cartilage degeneration by stem cell-based tissue engineering could be of enormous therapeutic and economic benefit for an aging population. Bone marrow-derived mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) that can induce chondrogenic differentiation would provide an appropriate cell source to repair damaged cartilage tissues; however, we must first understand the optimal environmental conditions for chondrogenic differentiation. In this review, we will focus on identifying the best combination of MSCs and functional extracellular matrices that provides the most successful chondrogenesis.
Various imaging technologies have become increasingly important in developing a better understanding of information on the biological and clinical phenomena associated with diseases of interest. Of these technologies, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is one of the most powerful for clinical diagnosis and in vivo imaging without the exposure to ionising radiation or radiotracers. Despite its many advantages, there are intrinsic limitations caused by MRI contrast agents, such as short vascular half-life circulation, which lead to unwanted side effects. In this review, we will focus on the multifunctional modification of MRI contrast agents for diagnosis and therapy.
Endothelial cell-coated stents have attracted interest as an ideal treatment method for preventing restenosis following stent deployment to the peripheral locations. In an attempt to evaluate the proliferation and differentiation activities of human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs), the acetylated polysaccharide, pullulan acetate (PA), loaded with vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) (PA/V), a major potential factor influencing vascularization, was examined as a coating for peripherally placed stents. The surface of the PA/V-coated stents observed by scanning electron microscopy was smoother than that of the bare nitinol stents. In an in vitro study, the HUVECs attached to PA/V-coated stents survived and proliferated well compared to the bare stents or stents with only a PA coating (without VEGF). These results were supported by in vivo tests using nude mice. In addition, histology and immunohistochemistry analyses showed that mature endothelial cell-specific markers were expressed at high levels by HUVECs attached to PA-coated stents when VEGF was released. These results suggest that coating stents with PA/V provides a new effective approach for increasing endothelization and prevents stent restenosis.
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