Abstract:

BACKGROUND: Large cartilage defects is a difficulty problem in clinical treatment, and stem cell techniques provide a theoretic support for this problem. It is a new attempt that applying novel scaffold chitosan-collagen protein with stem cells to transplant in animal models.
OBJECTIVE: To observe the histological changes of chitosan-collagen gel in combined with bone marrow mesenchymal stem cell for repairing rabbit articular cartilage defects.
METHODS: Rabbit bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells were cultured in vitro. P2 cells were differentiated in chondrogenic medium. Chitosan-collagen scaffold and rabbit articular cartilage defect models were produced. The defects were filled with chitosan-collagen gel scaffold containing bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells, while the other joint was treated with cell-free scaffold or received no treatment. There were 12 joints serving as experiment group (treated by bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells + scaffold), 8 joints as blank control group (with no treatment) and 8 joints as single scaffold group (with no cells). At 2, 4, 8, 16 weeks after the establishment of rabbit models, the rabbits were killed and then histological staining was done.
RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: At 16 weeks after the establishment of defect models, the transplanted cells differentiated into chondrocytes, a majority of cartilage defect areas were repaired by new cartilage, the histological scores showed good articular repair in experiment group. Bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells combined chitosan-collagen could repair articular cartilage defect.