Tissue engineering is a biomedical engineering discipline that uses a combination of cells, engineering, materials methods, and suitable biochemical and physicochemical factors to restore, maintain, improve, or replace different types of biological tissues. Tissue engineering often involves the use of cells placed on tissue scaffolds in the formation of new viable tissue for a medical purpose, but is not limited to applications involving cells and tissue scaffolds. While it was once categorized as a sub-field of biomaterials, having grown in scope and importance, it can is considered as a field of its own.
A hydrogel is a biphasic material, a mixture of porous, permeable solids and at least 10% by weight or volume of interstitial fluid composed completely or mainly by water. In hydrogels the porous permeable solid is a water insoluble three dimensional network of natural or synthetic polymers and a fluid, having absorbed a large amount of water or biological fluids. These properties underpin several applications, especially in the biomedical area. Many hydrogels are synthetic, but some are derived from nature. The term 'hydrogel' was coined in 1894.
Electrospinning is a fiber production method that uses electric force to draw charged threads of polymer solutions or polymer melts up to fiber diameters in the order of some hundred nanometers. Electrospinning shares characteristics of both electrospraying and conventional solution dry spinning of fibers. The process does not require the use of coagulation chemistry or high temperatures to produce solid threads from solution. This makes the process particularly suited to the production of fibers using large and complex molecules. Electrospinning from molten precursors is also practiced; this method ensures that no solvent can be carried over into the final product.
Nanofibers are fibers with diameters in the nanometer range. Nanofibers can be generated from different polymers and hence have different physical properties and application potentials. Examples of natural polymers include collagen, cellulose, silk fibroin, keratin, gelatin and polysaccharides such as chitosan and alginate. Examples of synthetic polymers include poly(lactic acid) (PLA), polycaprolactone (PCL), polyurethane (PU), poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA), poly(3-hydroxybutyrate-co-3-hydroxyvalerate) (PHBV), and poly(ethylene-co-vinylacetate) (PEVA). Polymer chains are connected via covalent bonds. The diameters of nanofibers depend on the type of polymer used and the method of production. All polymer nanofibers are unique for their large surface area-to-volume ratio, high porosity, appreciable mechanical strength, and flexibility in functionalization compared to their microfiber counterparts.
A nerve guidance conduit is an artificial means of guiding axonal regrowth to facilitate nerve regeneration and is one of several clinical treatments for nerve injuries. When direct suturing of the two stumps of a severed nerve cannot be accomplished without tension, the standard clinical treatment for peripheral nerve injuries is autologous nerve grafting. Due to the limited availability of donor tissue and functional recovery in autologous nerve grafting, neural tissue engineering research has focused on the development of bioartificial nerve guidance conduits as an alternative treatment, especially for large defects. Similar techniques are also being explored for nerve repair in the spinal cord but nerve regeneration in the central nervous system poses a greater challenge because its axons do not regenerate appreciably in their native environment.
Ali Khademhosseini is the CEO of the Terasaki Institute, non-profit research organization in Los Angeles, and Omeat Inc., a cultivated-meat startup. Before taking his current CEO roles, he spent one year at Amazon Inc. Prior to that he was the Levi Knight chair and professor at the University of California-Los Angeles where he held a multi-departmental professorship in Bioengineering, Radiology, Chemical, and Biomolecular Engineering as well as the Director of Center for Minimally Invasive Therapeutics (C-MIT). From 2005 to 2017, he was a professor at Harvard Medical School, and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering.
Nano-scaffolding or nanoscaffolding is a medical process used to regrow tissue and bone, including limbs and organs. The nano-scaffold is a three-dimensional structure composed of polymer fibers very small that are scaled from a Nanometer scale. Developed by the American military, the medical technology uses a microscopic apparatus made of fine polymer fibers called a scaffold. Damaged cells grip to the scaffold and begin to rebuild missing bone and tissue through tiny holes in the scaffold. As tissue grows, the scaffold is absorbed into the body and disappears completely.
A fibrin scaffold is a network of protein that holds together and supports a variety of living tissues. It is produced naturally by the body after injury, but also can be engineered as a tissue substitute to speed healing. The scaffold consists of naturally occurring biomaterials composed of a cross-linked fibrin network and has a broad use in biomedical applications.
Arginylglycylaspartic acid (RGD) is the most common peptide motif responsible for cell adhesion to the extracellular matrix (ECM), found in species ranging from Drosophila to humans. Cell adhesion proteins called integrins recognize and bind to this sequence, which is found within many matrix proteins, including fibronectin, fibrinogen, vitronectin, osteopontin, and several other adhesive extracellular matrix proteins. The discovery of RGD and elucidation of how RGD binds to integrins has led to the development of a number of drugs and diagnostics, while the peptide itself is used ubiquitously in bioengineering. Depending on the application and the integrin targeted, RGD can be chemically modified or replaced by a similar peptide which promotes cell adhesion.
Three dimensional (3D) bioprinting is the utilization of 3D printing–like techniques to combine cells, growth factors, bio-inks, and biomaterials to fabricate functional structures that were traditionally used for tissue engineering applications but in recent times have seen increased interest in other applications such as biosensing, and environmental remediation. Generally, 3D bioprinting utilizes a layer-by-layer method to deposit materials known as bio-inks to create tissue-like structures that are later used in various medical and tissue engineering fields. 3D bioprinting covers a broad range of bioprinting techniques and biomaterials. Currently, bioprinting can be used to print tissue and organ models to help research drugs and potential treatments. Nonetheless, translation of bioprinted living cellular constructs into clinical application is met with several issues due to the complexity and cell number necessary to create functional organs. However, innovations span from bioprinting of extracellular matrix to mixing cells with hydrogels deposited layer by layer to produce the desired tissue. In addition, 3D bioprinting has begun to incorporate the printing of scaffolds which can be used to regenerate joints and ligaments. Apart from these, 3D bioprinting has recently been used in environmental remediation applications, including the fabrication of functional biofilms that host functional microorganisms that can facilitate pollutant removal.
The in vivo bioreactor is a tissue engineering paradigm that uses bioreactor methodology to grow neotissue in vivo that augments or replaces malfunctioning native tissue. Tissue engineering principles are used to construct a confined, artificial bioreactor space in vivo that hosts a tissue scaffold and key biomolecules necessary for neotissue growth. Said space often requires inoculation with pluripotent or specific stem cells to encourage initial growth, and access to a blood source. A blood source allows for recruitment of stem cells from the body alongside nutrient delivery for continual growth. This delivery of cells and nutrients to the bioreactor eventually results in the formation of a neotissue product.
Muscle tissue engineering is a subset of the general field of tissue engineering, which studies the combined use of cells and scaffolds to design therapeutic tissue implants. Within the clinical setting, muscle tissue engineering involves the culturing of cells from the patient's own body or from a donor, development of muscle tissue with or without the use of scaffolds, then the insertion of functional muscle tissue into the patient's body. Ideally, this implantation results in full regeneration of function and aesthetic within the patient's body. Outside the clinical setting, muscle tissue engineering is involved in drug screening, hybrid mechanical muscle actuators, robotic devices, and the development of engineered meat as a new food source.
Molly S. Shoichet, is a Canadian science professor, specializing in chemistry, biomaterials and biomedical engineering. She was Ontario's first Chief Scientist. Shoichet is a biomedical engineer known for her work in tissue engineering, and is the only person to be a fellow of the three National Academies in Canada.
Treena Livingston Arinzeh is an American biomedical engineer and academic.
Tissue engineered heart valves (TEHV) offer a new and advancing proposed treatment of creating a living heart valve for people who are in need of either a full or partial heart valve replacement. Currently, there are over a quarter of a million prosthetic heart valves implanted annually, and the number of patients requiring replacement surgeries is only suspected to rise and even triple over the next fifty years. While current treatments offered such as mechanical valves or biological valves are not deleterious to one's health, they both have their own limitations in that mechanical valves necessitate the lifelong use of anticoagulants while biological valves are susceptible to structural degradation and reoperation. Thus, in situ (in its original position or place) tissue engineering of heart valves serves as a novel approach that explores the use creating a living heart valve composed of the host's own cells that is capable of growing, adapting, and interacting within the human body's biological system.
Elizabeth Cosgriff-Hernandez is an American biomedical engineer who is a professor at the University of Texas at Austin. Her work involves the development of polymeric biomaterials for medical devices and tissue regeneration. She also serves on the scientific advisory board of ECM Biosurgery and as a consultant to several companies on biostability evaluation of medical devices. Cosgriff-Hernandez is an associate editor of the Journal of Materials Chemistry B and Fellow of the International Union of Societies for Biomaterials Science and Engineering, Biomedical Engineering Society, Royal Society of Chemistry, and the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering.
Tatiana Segura is an American biomedical engineer who is a professor at Duke University. Her research considers biomedical engineering solutions to promote cell growth. She was elected Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering in 2017 and awarded the Acta Biomaterialia Silver Medal in 2021.
Bioprinting drug delivery is a method of using the three-dimensional printing of biomaterials through an additive manufacturing technique to develop drug delivery vehicles that are biocompatible tissue-specific hydrogels or implantable devices. 3D bioprinting uses printed cells and biological molecules to manufacture tissues, organs, or biological materials in a scaffold-free manner that mimics living human tissue to provide localized and tissue-specific drug delivery, allowing for targeted disease treatments with scalable and complex geometry.
Ultrasound-triggered drug delivery using stimuli-responsive hydrogels refers to the process of using ultrasound energy for inducing drug release from hydrogels that are sensitive to acoustic stimuli. This method of approach is one of many stimuli-responsive drug delivery-based systems that has gained traction in recent years due to its demonstration of localization and specificity of disease treatment. Although recent developments in this field highlight its potential in treating certain diseases such as COVID-19, there remain many major challenges that need to be addressed and overcome before more related biomedical applications are clinically translated into standard of care.
Miqin Zhang is an American materials scientist who is the Kyocera Professor of Materials Science at the University of Washington. Her research considers the development of new biomaterials for medical applications. Her group develops nanoparticles for cancer diagnosis and imaging, biocompatible materials for drug delivery and cell-based biosensors.
