Articular cartilage repair remains a challenge to surgeons and basic scientists. The field of tissue engineering allows the simultaneous use of material scaffolds, cells and signalling molecules to attempt to modulate the regenerative tissue. This review summarises the research that has been undertaken to date using this approach, with a particular emphasis on those techniques that have been introduced into clinical practice, via in vitro and preclinical studies.

The subject of central nervous system damage includes a wide variety of problems, from the slow selective ‘picking off’ of characteristic sub-populations of neurons typical of neurodegenerative diseases, to the wholesale destruction of areas of brain and spinal cord seen in traumatic injury and stroke. Experimental repair strategies are diverse and the type of pathology dictates which approach will be appropriate. Damage may be to grey matter (loss of neurons), white matter (cutting of axons, leaving neurons otherwise intact, at least initially) or both. This review will consider four possible forms of treatment for repair of the human central nervous system.