NYSCF Scientists Interviewed About New Bone Engineering Technique by RegMedNet

NYSCF researchers recently published a study outlining an exciting new bioengineering process (called Segmental Additive Tissue Engineering, or “SATE”) that allows scientists to create large scale, personalized bone grafts from stem cells. In a new interview with RegMedNet (a news outlet affiliated with the journal Regenerative Medicine) NYSCF – Ralph Lauren Senior Investigator Dr. Giuseppe Maria de Peppo and NYSCF Staff Scientist Dr. Martina Sladkova discuss why SATE was developed, how it works, and how it will help improve treatments for orthopedic injury.

In the interview, the researchers underscored the problems with current treatments and the advantages of engineering bone grafts from stem cells.

“All current treatment options present several disadvantages that can lead to severe health complications,” they explain. “The ability to use bone grafts grown from patients’ own cells could help overcome these issues, which include limited bone transplant availability, risk of disease transmission, long recovery time, poor graft integration and remodeling, and biomaterial associated infections.”

While engineering bone grafts from stem cells addresses many of the limitations surrounding current treatments, it has traditionally only been done for small defects. With SATE, however, researchers can combine bioengineered segments of bone to replace large scale damage—a first for the field.

The technique is also standardized, versatile, and easy to implement, allowing for bioengineered bone grafts to more quickly make the leap from bench to bedside, where the team hopes they will provide much-needed relief to patients.

“Someday, the use of bone transplants and alloplastic materials for bone reconstructions might become a thing of the past,” the researchers say. “We are hopeful that this new strategy will one day be able to improve the lives of the millions of people suffering from bone injury due to trauma, cancer, osteoporosis, osteonecrosis and other devastating conditions of the skeletal system.”

Read the full interview here.