Biomaterials research in Japan.

Research into biomaterials in Japan began with dental materials, as in Western countries, and only conventional materials were studied in the early stages of research. Since the early 1930s, various new types of organic polymers have been synthesized, mainly in Western countries, and their structure and properties have been investigated extensively. Their application began in industrial fields, but this was soon extended to the biomedical field. Leading scientists in Japan also began to be interested in biomedical applications of such polymers in the early 1970s. Theirmain interest was focused on the compatibility of these polymers with blood. Various surface modifications of polymers were attempted, and the effect of the structure and morphology of the surfaces of the polymers on their compatibility with blood was investigated. Some interesting papers were published from this research (Nakai et al. 1977; Suzuki et al. 1986; Ishihara et al. 1990; Okano et al. 1993), and other unique research paths have been developed; some of these are introduced in the present issue of this journal. Prof. Iwata presents a novel observation on the dynamic behaviour of mesenchymal stem cells on nanogrooved patterns on polymers. Prof. Ishihara presents a novel surface modification of polymers based on the cell membrane structure, and its application in bionanodevices. Prof. Okano also presents a novel surface modification of polymers and its application to the recovery of contiguous living cell sheets for tissue engineering. Prof. Tabata presents novel examples of applications of polymers to cell scaffolds and drug delivery systems (DDSs) of biosignalling molecules for tissue engineering. Prof. Kataoka will present a novel control of the nanostructures of polymers and its application to DDSs for anti-cancer drugs and genes in the next issue of this journal. High-purity alumina ceramics with high density were developed for electronic applications throughout the 1970s, and these were applied in artificial hip joints in