Designing bone healing therapies that better mimic regeneration

The range of biomimetic approaches to promote bone growth that are at the core of current bone healing therapies need to more closely emulate natural regenerative mechanisms. A review of biomimetic strategies to help heal bone defects, with an emphasis on cell transplantation, is published in BioResearch Open Access.

In the article entitled "Biomimetics of Bone Implants: The Regenerative Road," Derrick Wan, MD and a team of researchers from Stanford University School of Medicine and Stanford University, California, examine the mechanical stability of bone implants and the effectiveness and challenges of grafts based on soluble bone minerals, structural proteins that comprise the extracellular matrix, or implants containing active cell populations.

"This article provides a comprehensive review of the literature and current implant products. The focus on biomimetics for regenerative strategies provides a new and exciting avenue for research," says BioResearch Open Access Editor Jane Taylor, PhD, Edinburgh Medical School: Biomedical Sciences, University of Edinburgh, Scotland.