Repair and regeneration of articular cartilage lesions have always been a major challenge in the medical field due to its peculiar structure (e.g., sparsely distributed chondrocytes, no blood supply, no nerves). Articular cartilage tissue engineering is considered as one promising strategy to achieve reconstruction of cartilage. With this perspective, the articular cartilage tissue engineering has been widely studied. Here, the recent progress of articular cartilage tissue engineering is reviewed. The ad hoc therapeutic cells and growth factors for cartilage regeneration are summarized and discussed. Various types of bio/macromolecular scaffolds together with their pros and cons are also reviewed and elaborated.
Abstract:Repair and regeneration of articular cartilage has always been a major challenge in the medical field due to its peculiar structure (e.g. sparsely distributed chondrocytes, no blood supply). Cartilage tissue engineering is one promising strategy for cartilage repair, however, one critical issue for cartilage tissue engineering is the integration between tissue-engineered and native cartilage. In recent years, osteochondral tissue engineering have attracted growing interest for overcoming this problem. Herein, we review the development of osteochondral tissue engineering. Firstly, currently used seed cells in osteochondral tissue engineering will be described. Secondly, several types of scaffolds and their (dis)advantage for osteochondral tissue engineering will be introduced. Thirdly, the growth factors currently used in osteochondral tissue engineering will be presented and discussed.
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