Articular cartilage covers the end of bones in joints and determines the load-bearing characteristics and mobility of joints. It has a thin, smooth, low friction surface with a remarkable resiliency to compressive forces. In general, chondrocytes occupy lacunae in the matrix, and produce cartilaginous ECM (extracellular matrix), which consists of type II collagen (13%), proteoglycans (7%), and ...

Learning Objectives: Patulous eustachian tube (PET) can have a significant negative impact on a patient’s quality of life. Several methods of surgical management can be an option to treat PET, and our objective is to evaluate the safety and efficacy of autologous cartilage injection in patients with PET. Thirty-three ears of twenty-five patientswith chronic PET refractory to conservative treatm...

Objective: Autologous osteochondral transplantation (OCT) is an option to treat articular cartilage defects. However, poor graft integration at the cartilage defect/graft interface and secondary graft degeneration limit the use of autologous OCT. Cell sheet engineering offers hope in regenerative medicine. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of synovium derived mesenchymal stem...

OBJECTIVES To determine whether rabbit cartilage can be tissue engineered using a polyglycolic acid (PGA) construct composed of PGA mesh, autologous chondrocytes, and alginate covalently linked with the cell adhesion sequence arginine-glycine-aspartic acid (RGD), and to investigate the feasibility of reconstructing tracheal defects using the PGA construct in conjunction with a bioabsorbable int...

Cartilage defects represent a serious problem due to the poor regenerative properties of this tissue. Regarding the nose, nasal valve collapse is associated with nasal blockage and persistent airway obstruction associated with a significant drop in the quality of life for patients. In addition to surgical techniques, several cell-based tissue-engineering strategies are studied to improve cartil...

OBJECTIVE The goal of this report is to describe the outcome of sequential particulated cartilage allograft and autologous osteochondral transfer treatments for an osteochondral lesion of the medial femoral condyle. METHODS A 44-year-old woman was treated with a particulated juvenile articular cartilage allograft (DeNovo NT) for a chondral lesion of the knee. As a result of continued pain, sh...

Articular cartilage defects at the knee joint are being identified and treated with increasing frequency. Chondrocytes may have strongest potential to generate high-quality repair tissue within the defective region, in particular when large diameter defects are present. Autologous chondrocyte implantation is not available in every country. We present a case where we spontaneously covered an acu...

J Bone Joint Surg [Br] 2009;91-B:997-1006. Chondral damage to the knee is common and, if left untreated, can proceed to degenerative osteoarthritis. In symptomatic patients established methods of management rely on the formation of fibrocartilage which has poor resistance to shear forces. The formation of hyaline or hyaline-like cartilage may be induced by implanting autologous, cultured chondr...

BACKGROUND We sought to determine the effectiveness of chondroprogenitor cells derived from autologous and allogenic articular cartilage for the repair of cartilage defects in an equine model. METHODS Cartilage defects (15 mm) were created on the medial trochlear ridge of the femur. The following experimental treatments were compared with empty-defect controls: fibrin only, autologous chondro...

Cartilage has poor regeneration capacity due to the scarcity of endogenous stem cells, its low metabolic activity and the avascular environment. Repair strategies vary widely, including microfracture, autologous or allogenic tissue implantation, and in vitro engineered tissues of autologous origin. However, unlike the advances that have been made over more than two decades with more complex org...