Scaffold-free Cartilage Tissue by Mechanical Stress Loading for Tissue Engineering

Articular cartilage has a limited repair capacity due to its low mitotic activity, avascular nature, and sparse cell population. Osteoarthritis, a painful condition of the joints, has affected over 200 million people worldwide. Cell-based tissue engineering is emerging as a promising clinical option to address tissue and organ failure by implanting biological substitutes for the compromised tissue. Various dynamic stresses such as shear flow, hydrostatic pressure, and direct compression exist in living bodies and are thought to contribute to cartilage formation. A rotational culture can provide such a mechanical load in a simple manner. In this chapter, we introduce our recent scaffoldf-free cartilage tissue engineering approaches using such a rotational culture.