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Reviews
Beyond the skeleton: Cnidarian biomaterials as bioactive extracellular microenvironments for tissue engineering
Razi Vago
volume 4 | issue 1
jan/feb/mar 2008Pages: 18 - 22
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Biomaterials play a pivotal role as scaffolding materials in the study of three-dimensional (3D) cell and tissue development and in a variety of bioengineering strategies for the restoration of damaged and malfunctioning tissues. Both in vitro and in vivo (e.g. cell-based therapies) bioengineering strategies deliver cells or a mixture of cells and signaling factors to a target tissue together with an acellular scaffolding material that triggers tissue ingrowth and regeneration. Bioengineering strategies in which tissue-like constructs are produced under controlled conditions are based on 3D lattices as vehicles for the cells that regenerate into the required tissues. Fabrication of engineered tissue is a complicated task, since tissue function is controlled by complex spatially and temporally ordered cues, each of which is the product of a myriad of cell-to-cell and cell-to-extracellular matrix (ECM) interactions.
Authors
Razi Vago
Department of Biotechnology Engineering; Ben-Gurion University of the Negev; Beer Sheva, Israel