Should human chondrocytes fly? The impact of electromagnetic irradiation on chondrocyte viability and implications for their use in tissue engineering

Abstract

A significant logistic factor as to the successful clinical application of the autologous tissue engineering concept is efficient transportation: the donor cells need to be delivered to tissue processing facilities which in most cases requires air transportation. This study was designed to evaluate how human chondrocytes react to X-ray exposure. Primary cell cultures were established, cultured, incubated and exposed to different doses and time periods of radiation.Subsequently, quantitative cell proliferation assays were done and qualitative evaluation of cellular protein production were performed. Our results show that after irradiation of chondrocytes with different doses, no significant differences in terms of cellular viability occurred compared with the control group. These results were obtained when chondrocytes were exposed to luggage transillumination doses as well as exposure to clinically used radiation doses. Any damage affecting cell growth or quality was not observed in our study. However, information about damage of cellular DNA remains incomplete.

Can low frequency electromagnetic field help cartilage tissue engineering?

“…One‐time exposure of EMF caused little long‐term changes in chondrocyte cells in vitro in terms of improving cartilage tissue repair. Several groups have reported that EMF did not alter extracellular matrix production of cultured chondrocytes 16, 17, 20, 33. Type I collagen, which was used as the matrix in this project, composes only a small portion in articular cartilage and does not have the desired mechanical property similar to natural cartilage.…”

“…Although many studies highlighted potential EMF application in cartilage repair, between study differences in the species, cell type, EMF characteristics, and exposure protocols, and cell culture media selection and the serum content, imposed considerable difficulties to generalization with respect to cause and effect 17–19, 33, 34. Elliott et al34 found EMFs generated by coils oriented vertically and horizontally had different effects on chondrocyte proliferation.…”

Effect of Pulsed Electromagnetic Fields on the Bioactivity of Human Osteoarthritic Chondrocytes

“…Various studies have evaluated the potential of pulsed electromagnetic fields on cartilage repair and chondrocyte bioactivity, but definitive conclusions and recommendations cannot be made due to different cell types, tested species, PEMF characteristics, exposure protocols, cell culture media selection, and serum content of these previous investigations. 27,[29][30][31][32][33] Although Nicolin et al 34 and De Mattei et al 35 reported that PEMF had a significant effect on increasing chondrocyte proliferation and producing extracellular matrix, other studies demon-…”