Tissueengineered skin and the treatment of burns: Skin doctor

The increasing survival rates of extensively burnt patients due to the progress in intensive care has amplified the need to find alternative strategies to cover these deep burns. Tissueengineered skin models have been developed; culturing keratinocytes over a collagen gel or sponge populated with fibroblasts. Some of these models have been commercialized as biomaterials or highly sophisticated wound dressings, demonstrating the feasibility of tissueengineered skin development from bench to bedside. Investigations now aim to optimize these models to overcome some limitations encoun tered in their clinical applications, such as their vascularization and innervation.