To the naked eye it looks like an anonymous rubbery mucus, but instead it hides a possible revolution for regenerative medicine. We are talking about an innovative biomaterial created in the laboratories of Northhestern University, capable of inducing the regrowth of articular cartilage damaged by accidents and degenerative diseases such as osteoarthritis. For now it has been successfully tested on sheep, animals with joints extremely similar to those of our species, and if in the future it confirms its effectiveness also on humans it could offer a revolutionary therapeutic option for diseases that until now could only be treated surgically.
“Cartilage is a critical component of our joints,” explains Samuel Stupp, a researcher at Northwestern University who led the development of the new biomaterial. “When cartilage is damaged or degraded over time, it can have a serious effect on people’s overall health and mobility. And the problem is that in adults, cartilage doesn’t have an innate ability to regenerate. Our new therapy can therefore induce repair in a tissue that doesn’t heal naturally, and we think it helps address a major unmet need.”
The material, described in a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is born from the union of two components: a bioactive peptide capable of binding to a protein essential for the growth and maintenance of cartilage – called TGFb-1, or transforming growth factor beta-1 – and a type of chemically modified hyaluronic acid. The result is a gel that can be injected into joints, and once inside them it attracts the cells needed to regenerate cartilage and provides them with a perfect substrate to act.
The material has so far been tested on sheep with degeneration of articular cartilage, and in about six months it allowed the animals to walk again without pain, promoting the formation of new cartilage tissue to replace the degraded one. The results will need to be confirmed in our species, but in the future the researchers hope that the material will help treat disabling diseases such as osteoarthritis, improve the effectiveness of arthroscopic interventions for the resolution of lesions to the meniscus and cartilage of the knee, and, at least in some cases, could completely avoid the need for knee prostheses.