The synthetic artificial stem cell (SASC): Shifting the paradigm of cell therapy in regenerative engineering

Significance This paper presents the synthetic artificial stem cell (SASC) system: a versatile therapy which provides the ability to tailor paracrine responses of different cells and provide a more potent regenerative effect for targeted tissues. Upon challenging the SASC system against an osteoarthritis model, we demonstrate that the factors combined tailored for chondrogenesis have a potent antiinflammatory and chondroprotective effect. This paper also demonstrates the in vivo capacity of SASC to attenuate proteoglycan depletion in the cartilage extracellular matrix while also improving biomechanical properties of the resulting cartilage. We report the first of many applications of the SASC system, which provides a promising step toward clinical translation of a minimally immunogenic stem cell with many commercial advantages over its biological counterpart.