Engineering of Functional Tendon

Abstract

Surgical tendon repair is limited by the availability of viable tissue for transplantation. Because of its relatively avascular nature, tendon is a prime candidate for engineered tissue replacement. To address this problem, cells isolated from rat Achilles tendon were grown to confluence in culture and allowed to self-assemble into a cylinder between two anchor points. The resulting scaffold-free tissue was composed of aligned, small-diameter collagen fibrils, a large number of cells, and an excess of noncollagenous extracellular matrix; all characteristics of embryonic tendon. The stress-strain response of the constructs also resembles the nonlinear behavior of immature tendons, and the ultimate tensile strength is approximately equal to that of embryonic chick tendon, roughly 2 MPa. These physical and mechanical properties indicate that these constructs are the first viable tendons engineered in vitro, without the aid of artificial scaffolding.

The past, present and future in scaffold-based tendon treatments

“…The rationale of this approach is based on the fact that cells can create their own tissue-specific ECM, bypassing the need for artificial devices and their shortfalls. The first in vitro study demonstrated that such cellular assemblies resemble the nonlinear behaviour of immature tendons [440]. Using rat TSCs, a neotendon tissue was formed that after eight weeks in a rat patellar tendon defect model showed marked improvement in histological scores, tissue alignment and mechanical properties, as compared to naturally healed control [441].…”

In vitro study comparing two collageneous membranes in view of their clinical application for rotator cuff tendon regeneration

“…In these cases, the tendon is recognized to be a prime candidate for engineeredtissue replacement. 21 However, so far, few studies have been done on rotator cuff tendon regeneration by means of in situ tissue engineering and in vitro bioengineering of tendons as compared to the extensive work on bone and cartilage. 6,14,[22][23][24][25] This previous literature review, showed the necessity for future studies in this area, and, therefore, an in vitro study was performed by isolating tenocytes from the rotator cuff of normal and GC-treated rats.…”

“…9 In the present study, cells derived from tendons were used and were characterized by means of cell morphology and ECM protein production as performed in many other studies. 12,13,21,23,26,29,30,33,35 Moreover, in our study in order to maintain the phenotype we used the explant technique, in which cells are permitted to grow from small fragments of tissue instead of enzymatic digestion that affects cell membrane and destroys the cell-cell and cell-matrix relationship. 36 It is reported that the explant technique is best to determine the phenotype of the cells derived from tendons.…”

Genska Terapija I Njena Implikacija U Sportu

“…This technique involves construction of whole body tissues in the laboratory, and their inplantation into patients. Several studies have demonstrated engineering whole tendons in such a manner (Calve, Dennis, Kosnik, Baar, Grosh, & Arruda, 2004;Cao, Liu, Wei, Xu, Cui, & Cao, 2006). These strategies are currently at an early stage of development and their full impact needs to be the focus of intense research.…”