Tissue Engineering: A Biological Solution for Tissue Damage, Loss or End Stage Organ Failure

In recent years the science of tissue engineering has emerged as a powerful tool for the development of a novel set of tissue replacement parts and technologies. Recent advances in the fields of biomaterials, stem cell technologies, growth factor field and biomimetics have created a unique set of opportunities for investigators to fabricate lab-grown tissues from combination of extracellular matrices (scaffolds), cells, and bioactive molecules. Despite these breakthrough advances, the major challenges facing this new emerging field of bioengineering remain unresolved as lab-grown tissues still exhibit a general lack of functional and biomechanical stability needed for transplantation. A successful strategy to develop true human replacement parts requires a multidisciplinary approach that converges recent advances in tissue, matrix, growth factor and developmental biology with recent technological breakthroughs in tissueinformatics, bioinformatics, highthrouput combinatorial chemistry and stem cell technologies.