Shulou(Shulou.com)05/31 Report--

A research team made up of several institutions in China and an institution in South Korea has developed a micro-robot system to regenerate rabbit knee cartilage. In a paper published in the year of Scientific Progress, the team described their system and its effects.

In many developed countries, the population is ageing, which means that the health status associated with aging is on the rise. A common disease in the elderly is the degeneration of cartilage in the knees and buttocks. When this happens, a common treatment is to replace the knee or hip with artificial equipment. In this new effort, researchers have found a better way to solve this problem-cartilage regeneration.

Previous studies have shown that mesenchymal stem cells found in bone marrow and fat can be induced to grow into chondrocytes. The researchers also found that stem cells can be used to repair damaged cartilage. The challenge is to put the cells where they are needed and keep them in place until they are attached to the surrounding tissue. In this new effort, researchers have built a system that can overcome these obstacles-at least in rabbits.

The researchers made a small hollow sphere with holes from a polymer called PLGA. Then, cover the ball with a mixture of iron and chitosan (a sugar). The next step is to fill the sphere with cultured mesenchymal stem cells. The balls were injected into the knee of the experimental rabbit, and the cartilage of the knee was destroyed (the researchers cut the gap). The rabbit was fitted with a magnet to keep the ball in place.

Three weeks later, the researchers found that rabbits treated with knee joints showed signs of cartilage recovery-the hollow ball deteriorated as expected. The cartilage of the untreated rabbits did not change. The team plans to test their systems with animals that are more like human knees, and if all goes well, they will start testing on human patients.

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