Extracellular Matrix Regenerative Treatment for Cartilage Repair

Abstract

Articular cartilage lesions caused by traumatic or age-dependent injuries are a major burden to patients and the healthcare system, often requiring painful surgical procedures and long convalescence periods. We have developed a human extracellular matrix-based treatment that leverages the proteins and glycosaminoglycans secreted by hypoxia-induced multipotent cells to create a biological scaffold for the repair and regeneration of hyaline cartilage. Using three established animal models of articular cartilage injury, we evaluated if the human extracellular matrix formulation applied to experimentally induced osteochondral defects was able to improve the healing process as evidenced by visual inspection and histological evaluation. While untreated control groups showed defects characterized by fibrous tissue and suboptimal bone and cartilage regeneration, the animal subjects including rats, rabbits and goats that received the human-derived extracellular matrix treatment induced pronounced tissue regeneration of vascularized subchondral bone and an overlying proteoglycan-rich articular cartilage layer at the site of the defects. The results reported here demonstrate that the bioengineered human extracellular matrix functions as a potential human-source, chondroconducive matrix that supports bone and hyaline articular cartilage regeneration for the use in clinical orthopedic applications.