Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Chapter 36
MATRICES FOR ZONAL CARTILAGE
TISSUE ENGINEERING
Daisy Irawan, Dietmar Hutmacher,
*
and Travis Klein
Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation, Queensland University
of Technology 60 Musk Ave, Kelvin Grove, QLD 4059 Australia
*dietmar.hutmacher@qut.edu.au
Articular cartilage is a hydrated tissue with a zonal structure that
allowsfore
cientjointarticulation.Thevariationsincell,matrix,
andfunctionalpropertiesfromthearticularsurfacearecommonly
lost in cartilage trauma or disease. Current treatments are not
su
cient to recreate these variations and have been limited in
their success. Hydrogel matrices offer an opportunity to provide
cellswith a three-dimensional environment that incorporates fea-
tures of different zones and create zonal tissue-engineered carti-
lage.Naturalhydrogelsbasedoncarbohydrates(includingalginate
and agarose) and proteins (including collagen and fibrin) allow
for the viable encapsulation of chondrocytes and have been used
to form zonal constructs with different cellular and extracellular
matrix properties. Synthetic and semisynthetic matrices (includ-
ing several based on poly(ethylene glycol) [PEG] and Extracel)
also have been designed and implemented to offer modular con-
trol over numerous properties such as cell attachment, modu-
lus, and degradability. The broad spectrum of hydrogel properties
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