A Multidisciplinary Journey towards Bone Tissue Engineering

Abstract

Millions of patients suffer yearly from bone fractures and disorders such as osteoporosis or cancer, which constitute the most common causes of severe long-term pain and physical disabilities. The intrinsic capacity of bone to repair the damaged bone allows normal healing of most small bone injuries. However, larger bone defects or more complex diseases require additional stimulation to fully heal. In this context, the traditional routes to address bone disorders present several associated drawbacks concerning their efficacy and cost-effectiveness. Thus, alternative therapies become necessary to overcome these limitations. In recent decades, bone tissue engineering has emerged as a promising interdisciplinary strategy to mimic environments specifically designed to facilitate bone tissue regeneration. Approaches developed to date aim at three essential factors: osteoconductive scaffolds, osteoinduction through growth factors, and cells with osteogenic capability. This review addresses the biological basis of bone and its remodeling process, providing an overview of the bone tissue engineering strategies developed to date and describing the mechanisms that underlie cell–biomaterial interactions.

An automated 3D-printed perfusion bioreactor combinable with pulsed electromagnetic field stimulators for bone tissue investigations

“…In fact, although bone can usually regain functionality by self-healing, there are pathological conditions such as nonunion or large bone defects due to trauma, infections, tumors or osteoporosis in which self-healing fails, causing severe pain and immobility to patients 5 , 6 . Besides the conventional surgical procedures adopted for managing critical-sized bone defects, bone tissue engineering (BTE) is emerging as a promising strategy for generating in vitro functional bone tissue substitutes to be implanted for promoting in vivo bone regeneration 7 . BTE approaches are based on the effective interplay among osteogenic cells, three-dimensional (3D) porous scaffolds, and physiological chemical and physical stimuli 8 , 9 .…”

Novel Approaches and Biomaterials for Bone Tissue Engineering: A Focus on Silk Fibroin

“…The cortical bone also delimits the medullar cavity where bone marrow resides [ 5 ]. Four types of living bone cells can be identified: osteoblasts, osteocytes, osteoclasts and bone-lining cells, which together constitute the basic multicellular unit [ 6 ]. Bone extracellular matrix (ECM), a noncellular three-dimensional (3D) structure secreted by cells and made of specific proteins and polysaccharides, represents a complex and dynamic biological environment responsible for the features of the mature bone and involved in many important processes such as the regulation of cell functions, growth factors response, production of new bone by osteoblasts and osteocytes and absorption of bone by osteoclasts [ 7 , 8 ].…”

3D printing of conch-like scaffolds for guiding cell migration and directional bone growth

“…Nevertheless, most of conventional scaffolds prepared by 3D printing are crossly stacked by simple solid struts [ 16 , 17 ]. Although being porous, they still lack a suitable structure to guide bone cells to directionally migrate and improve the transmission of nutrients in scaffolds [ [18] , [19] , [20] , [21] , [22] , [23] , [24] , [25] , [26] ], resulting in the limited osteogenesis in center and distal part of the defects [ 27 ]. Thus, the structure of the 3D-printed scaffolds needs to be ingeniously designed to break through these limitations.…”