33 “Tissue Engineering and the Challenges Within”

“Tissue Engineering and the Challenges Within” by Kumar, Russell and Wargo

Alan J. Russell is one of three authors of a paper named, “Tissue Engineering and the Challenges Within.” This paper is about tissue engineering and explaining the challenges that researchers face in this field. These challenges lie in society, academia, material design, therapeutic cell selection, in vitro culturing of cells and materials and the integration of this engineered device into the body. The paper has a focus on redesigning a biomaterial through bridging the gap between synthetic and biological materials. This combination of synthetic and biological materials would allow for biological material to be seeded onto a synthetic polymer based scaffold.

The focus of scientists and researchers in the field of Tissue Engineering is to develop a technology that will, “improve or replace biological functions.” This is the goal of all biomaterial devices. In order to achieve this goal, there are many considerations to take including, material selection and construction, cell type, integration mode and more. For material selection, biological material or synthetic material can be used, separately or together. Each material type, biological and synthetic, have advantages and disadvantages to selecting them. While, biological materials have the ideal structure for cellular adherence and infiltration, synthetic materials have better processability and tailorable properties to fit the varied applications of these devices. One of these applications being a gradient scaffold. This is a scaffold that possesses both a degradable and non degradable section. The overall idea is that it would allow for seamless transitioning between the two sections all while promoting tissue regrowth and mechanically supporting the healing process. Researchers are exploring these novel biomaterial applications and processing methods to address current challenges in tissue engineering. The article suggests that gradient scaffolds could be a promising addition to existing biomaterials, facilitating the advancement of regenerative medicine.