Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday May 03 2017, @12:13AM   Printer-friendly
from the new-type-of-nose-prints dept.

A team of researchers at Sahlgrenska Academy has managed to generate cartilage tissue by printing stem cells using a 3D-bioprinter. The fact that the stem cells survived being printed in this manner is a success in itself. In addition, the research team was able to influence the cells to multiply and differentiate to form chondrocytes (cartilage cells) in the printed structure.

[...] The team used cartilage cells harvested from patients who underwent knee surgery, and these cells were then manipulated in a laboratory, causing them to rejuvenate and revert into "pluripotent" stem cells, i.e. stem cells that have the potential to develop into many different types of cells. The stem cells were then expanded and encapsulated in a composition of nanofibrillated cellulose and printed into a structure using a 3D bioprinter. Following printing, the stem cells were treated with growth factors that caused them to differentiate correctly, so that they formed cartilage tissue.

[...] The cartilage formed by the stem cells in the 3D bioprinted structure is extremely similar to human cartilage. Experienced surgeons who examined the artificial cartilage saw no difference when they compared the bioprinted tissue to real cartilage, and have stated that the material has properties similar to their patients' natural cartilage.

It's good news for sufferers of osteoarthritis and similar maladies.


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @12:22AM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @12:22AM (#503331)

    Trump can send Our Troops to Wars with a Promise that their injured cartilage will be repaired.

  • (Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Wednesday May 03 2017, @01:03AM (3 children)

    by Ethanol-fueled (2792) on Wednesday May 03 2017, @01:03AM (#503371) Homepage

    Besides joints and nose-jobs, something like this would be great for spinal discs -- you fuck up a spinal disc and you're in for a world of hurt so bad that not even opiates will help. It will take you 10 minutes to rise out of bed, 5 minutes to get into and out of your car. Sometimes the pain goes away magically with time (until you mess it up again), sometimes it doesn't.

    To address your obligatory discussion-derailing comment, though, it is not likely that large-scale troop-deployments will happen again in the near-future -- Now we send only a few "advisors" and use foreign armies of rabid unbathed savages, expecially since we no longer care about "collateral damage." The UN and your usual NGOs squawk about it and then business as usual continues.

    We probably wouldn't reach the point of war becoming palatable to the average American until we gained the ability to regrow brain cells, limbs, cocks, and balls; and do decent facial reconstructions even if it meant having to grow a whole new face. A good spouse can tolerate having a fake-leg, maybe even you in a wheelchair -- but if your balls got blown off or your face got melted off, that's it.

    • (Score: 2) by kaszz on Wednesday May 03 2017, @02:20AM (1 child)

      by kaszz (4211) on Wednesday May 03 2017, @02:20AM (#503414) Journal

      but if your balls got blown off or your face got melted off, that's it

      Is there statistics on that?

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @02:31AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @02:31AM (#503425)

        Hemingway wrote a whole book on it.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:05PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 03 2017, @07:05PM (#503860)

      this is why i came here. my disc ruptured twice, b/c once you do it once, you have to be much more careful. If they could just go in there and fuse/sew it shut on the edges that blew out, it would fill up again with the gelatinous fluid and i would be cured. all they currently do is go in there and snip it with scissors (or now laser) so it doesn't push into your sciatic nerve. that also means the disc is not doing it's job of cushioning your vertebrate and it can never be repaired properly(unless the learned to grow it back). typical western medicine hacks. hopefully one of these vile whores will finally decide to find a way to do this. there are millions of people with screwed up discs and it really tries to ruin your life. you're a lot of fun to be around when you're in pain all day every day. it also creates a near constant depression due to the pain. I wake up in pain and go to sleep with pain. the tiniest bit of research and common sense and they could have fixed this a long time ago. disintegrating sutures would probably do the trick. too small to suture by hand? some king of bioglue? or bioclamp?