Abstract:

BACKGROUND: There is not an ideal way to promote cartilage repair and regeneration.
OBJECTIVE: To review the research progress of related growth factor in cartilage tissue engineering.
METHODS: PubMed and CHKD databases were retrieved with key words of “cartilage, cell factor, tissue engineering” both in Chinese and English to search articles published between January 1997 and January 2009. Totally 38 papers were included for further analysis after removing repetitive studies.
RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: Studies demonstrated that cytokine, such as transforming growth factor β, fibroblast growth factor, insulin-like growth factors, bone morphogenetic protein, as well as cartilage-derived morphogenetic protein and other cell factors have significant impacts on cartilage repair. These factors mediate the entire process of cartilage repair, which can promote the proliferation and differentiation of cartilage cells and guide these cells to play its function. Presently, most studies concerning cytokine are at experimental levels, the safety of which in clinic still should be improved.