Scaffold for Growing Cartilage

Cartilage heals very slowly, due to a lack of blood vessels and other characteristics. One way to speed up natural cartilage repair and growth is to use tissue engineering, in which scaffolds, cells and other materials are combined to create functional replacement tissues. This image shows a three-dimensional biomaterial scaffold, consisting of multiple layers of resorbable fiber bundles that have been woven into a porous structure. The scaffold is infused with stem cells that grow to become new tissue as the fibers are resorbed. The fibers provide stiffness and strength in a manner that mimics healthy cartilage. This photo was selected as a 2012 winner of the BioArt competition of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB).