Facilitative Glucose Transporters in Articular Chondrocytes


Book Description

Articular cartilage is a highly specialized avascular connective tissue. This multidisciplinary article reviews the molecular and morphological aspects of GLUT expression and function in chondrocytes and their mesenchymal and embryonic stem cell precursors.




Cartilage and Osteoarthritis


Book Description

Osteoarthritis (OA), the most common form of arthritis, is generally characterized by a slowly progressive degeneration of articular cartilage, particularly in the weight-bearing joints. It has a stronger prevalence in women, and its incidence increases with age. OA is a major and growing health concern in developed countries, owing to steadily increasing life expectancy and the demand for better quality of life. Because of its chronic nature and nonfatal outcome, OA affects the growing population of the elderly over an increasing time span. Moreover, despite its relatively benign character, OA is one of the most disabling diseases; it is responsible for increasing financial and social burdens in terms of medical treatments, forced inactivity, loss of mobility, and dependence. Despite a growing awareness of OA as a medical problem that has yet to reach its maximum impact on society, there is a surprising absence of effective medical treatments beyond pain control and surgery. So far, only symptom-modifying drugs are available, while there remains a major demand for disease-modifying treatments of proven clinical efficacy. This demand will hopefully be met in the future by some of the drugs that have been pressed into development and are now at different stages of clinical investigation. Nevertheless, the current lack of effective treatments reflects a still insufficient knowledge of cartilage with respect to its metabolism, interactions with other joint tissues, and causes and mechanisms (possibly of very different nature) leading to failure of its turnover.




Bone Tissue Engineering


Book Description

Focusing on bone biology, Bone Tissue Engineering integrates basic sciences with tissue engineering. It includes contributions from world-renowned researchers and clinicians who discuss key topics such as different models and approaches to bone tissue engineering, as well as exciting clinical applications for patients. Divided into four sections, t




Articular Cartilage Tissue Engineering


Book Description

Cartilage injuries in children and adolescents are increasingly observed, with roughly 20% of knee injuries in adolescents requiring surgery. In the US alone, costs of osteoarthritis (OA) are in excess of $65 billion per year (both medical costs and lost wages). Comorbidities are common with OA and are also costly to manage. Articular cartilage's low friction and high capacity to bear load makes it critical in the movement of one bone against another, and its lack of a sustained natural healing response has necessitated a plethora of therapies. Tissue engineering is an emerging technology at the threshold of translation to clinical use. Replacement cartilage can be constructed in the laboratory to recapitulate the functional requirements of native tissues. This book outlines the biomechanical and biochemical characteristics of articular cartilage in both normal and pathological states, through development and aging. It also provides a historical perspective of past and current cartilage treatments and previous tissue engineering efforts. Methods and standards for evaluating the function of engineered tissues are discussed, and current cartilage products are presented with an analysis on the United States Food and Drug Administration regulatory pathways that products must follow to market. This book was written to serve as a reference for researchers seeking to learn about articular cartilage, for undergraduate and graduate level courses, and as a compendium of articular cartilage tissue engineering design criteria. Table of Contents: Hyaline Articular Cartilage / Cartilage Aging and Pathology / In Vitro / Bioreactors / Future Directions




Functional Tissue Engineering


Book Description

-Softcover reprint of a successful hardcover reference (370 copies sold) -Price to be accessible to the rapidly increasing population of students and investigators in the field of tissue engineering -Chapters written by well-known researchers discuss issues in functional tissue engineering as well as provide guidelines and a summary of the current state of technology




Advanced Techniques in Bone Regeneration


Book Description

Advanced Techniques in Bone Regeneration is a book that brings together over 15 chapters, written by leading practitioners and researchers, of the latest advances in the area, including surgical techniques, new discoveries, and promising methods involving biomaterials and tissue engineering. This book is intended for all who work in the treatment of disorders involving problems with the regeneration of bone tissue, are doctors or dentists, as well as are researchers and teachers involved in this exciting field of scientific knowledge.




Smart Biomaterials


Book Description

This book provides comprehensive coverage of smart biomaterials and their potential applications, a field that is developing at a very rapid pace. Because smart biomaterials are an emerging class of biomaterials that respond to small changes in external stimuli with large discontinuous changes in their physical properties, they have been designed to act as an “on–off” switch for, among others, bio separation, immunoanalysis, drug delivery technologies, gene therapy, diagnostics, bio sensors and artificial muscles. After an introduction to the topic and the history of smart biomaterials, the author gives the reader an in-depth look at the properties, mechanics, and characterization of smart biomaterials including hydrogels, particles, assemblies, surfaces, fibers and conjugates. Information on the wide range of applications for these materials follows, including drug delivery, tissue engineering, diagnostics, biosensors, bio separation and actuators. In addition, recent advances in shape memory biomaterials as active components of medical devices are also presented.




Organ Tissue Engineering


Book Description

The notion of being able to engineer complete organs has inspired an entire generation of researchers. While recent years have brought significant progress in regenerative medicine and tissue engineering, the immense challenges encountered when trying to engineer an entire organ have to be acknowledged. Despite a good understanding of cell phenotypes, cellular niches and cell-to-biomaterial interactions, the formation of tissues composed of multiple cells remains highly challenging. Only a step-by-step approach will allow the future production of a living tissue construct ready for implantation and to augment organ function. In this book, expert authors present the current state of this approach. It offers a concise overview and serves as a great starting point for anyone interested in the application of tissue engineering or regenerative medicine for organ engineering. Each chapter contains a short overview including physiological and pathological changes as well as the current clinical need. The potential cell sources and suitable biomaterials for each organ type are discussed and possibilities to produce organ-like structures are illustrated. The ultimate goal is for the generated small tissues to unfold their full potential in vivo and to serve as a native tissue equivalent. By integrating and evolving, these implants will form functional tissue in-vivo. This book discusses the desired outcome by focusing on well-defined functional readouts. Each chapter addresses the status of clinical translations and closes with the discussion of current bottlenecks and an outlook for the coming years. A successful regenerative medicine approach could solve organ shortage by providing biological substitutes for clinical use - clearly, this merits a collaborative effort.




Mesenchymal Stem Cell Therapy


Book Description

Over the past decade, significant efforts have been made to develop stem cell-based therapies for difficult to treat diseases. Multipotent mesenchymal stromal cells, also referred to as mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), appear to hold great promise in regards to a regenerative cell-based therapy for the treatment of these diseases. Currently, more than 200 clinical trials are underway worldwide exploring the use of MSCs for the treatment of a wide range of disorders including bone, cartilage and tendon damage, myocardial infarction, graft-versus-host disease, Crohn’s disease, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, critical limb ischemia and many others. MSCs were first identified by Friendenstein and colleagues as an adherent stromal cell population within the bone marrow with the ability to form clonogenic colonies in vitro. In regards to the basic biology associated with MSCs, there has been tremendous progress towards understanding this cell population’s phenotype and function from a range of tissue sources. Despite enormous progress and an overall increased understanding of MSCs at the molecular and cellular level, several critical questions remain to be answered in regards to the use of these cells in therapeutic applications. Clinically, both autologous and allogenic approaches for the transplantation of MSCs are being explored. Several of the processing steps needed for the clinical application of MSCs, including isolation from various tissues, scalable in vitro expansion, cell banking, dose preparation, quality control parameters, delivery methods and numerous others are being extensively studied. Despite a significant number of ongoing clinical trials, none of the current therapeutic approaches have, at this point, become a standard of care treatment. Although exceptionally promising, the clinical translation of MSC-based therapies is still a work in progress. The extensive number of ongoing clinical trials is expected to provide a clearer path forward for the realization and implementation of MSCs in regenerative medicine. Towards this end, reviews of current clinical trial results and discussions of relevant topics association with the clinical application of MSCs are compiled in this book from some of the leading researchers in this exciting and rapidly advancing field. Although not absolutely all-inclusive, we hope the chapters within this book can promote and enable a better understanding of the translation of MSCs from bench-to-bedside and inspire researchers to further explore this promising and quickly evolving field.