Tissue Engineering Beyond Regenerative Medicine: Biofabricating Leather
Gabor Forgacs, Professor, University of Missouri-Columbia; Founder, Modern Meadow
Most tissue engineering efforts are focused on applications in
regenerative medicine to improve the quality of life of patients.
Despite spectacular progress in the last 20 years the expected
breakthrough to replace dysfunctional tissues in the organism or
mitigate the chronic shortage of donor organs has not yet been achieved.
This is not surprising given the enormous challenge facing the
biofabrication of complex living structures in vitro and the associated
astronomical expenditures. Here we propose a more modest, but more
realistic utilization of the knowledge accumulated in tissue engineering
and associated biofabrication technologies over the years. As an
example we detail specific efforts to engineer a particular compartment
of a complex tissue, the skin that gives rise to a commercially useful
leather-like material. We compare our process with that followed by the
leather industry to point out the advantages and disadvantages of both.
We conclude by speculating more broadly on the significant potential
social benefits of our approach.
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