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JCMM JCMM

Available online at www.jcmm.ro www.jcmm.org

J. Cell. Mol. Med. Vol 10, No 3, 2006 pp. 569-576

Tissue Engineering Review Series

Guest Editor: R. E. Horch

The history of tissue engineering
Charles A. Vacanti *
Harvard Medical School, Department of Anesthesiology, Brigham and Womens Hospital, Boston, MA, USA Received: May 24, 2006; Accepted: July 21, 2006

•• •• •• ••The early years Development of an organizational structure The society ““Tissue Engineering””, the journal

•• Tissue engineering and the public arena •• Future challenges •• In conclusion actuality, a meeting held in the late 1980’’s in Keystone, Colorado entitled, ““Tissue Engineering””, sponsored by the National Science Foundation had very little to do with the discipline of tissueengineering as it is viewed today. While the meeting did emphasize efforts to manipulate living tissues and potentially combine them with prosthetic materials, the actual generation of new tissue utilizing biologics, either alone or in combination with appropriate scaffolding material was not a focus of the meeting. The roots of Tissue Engineering, as a modern scientific discipline, dedicated to thegeneration of new tissue using the principles of engineering in combination with an understanding and application of the biologic sciences, are deeply seated in Boston. To my knowledge, the first recorded use of the term Tissue Engineering, as it is applied today, was in a published article entitled, ““Functional Organ Replacement: The New Technology of Tissue Engineering”” [3] in ““Surgical TechnologyInternational”” in 1991.

It is essential to know where we have been in order to make reasonable predictions as to where we are headed. This article represents one person’’s recollection of the history of Tissue Engineering [1] and consequently, it will most certainly contain some personal biases. I apologize to any individuals whose significant contributions to the field of tissue engineeringthat may have not been presented here as a result of my own misunderstanding or oversight. In presenting a historical perspective of the emergence of tissue engineering as a multidisciplinary science, I will include the information concerning the development of the journal ““Tissue Engineering”” and the formation of the society, both of which have evolved during the last decade. Significant futurechallenges will be discussed. The famous painting by Fra Angeliac entitled, ““Healing of Justinian”” depicting the brothers Saints Damien and Cosmos Transplanting a Homograft limb onto a wounded soldier is often referred to as the first historical reference to ““tissue engineering””. However, Genesis I:1 ““The Lord, breathed a deep sleep on the man and while he was asleep he took out one of hisribs and closed up its place with flesh. The Lord God then built up into a woman the rib that he had taken from the man”” [2], may be interpreted as the oldest written reference. As recently as the 1980’’s, the term tissue engineering was loosely applied to the use of prosthetic devices and the surgical manipulation of tissues. In
* Correspondence to: Charles A. VACANTI, MD

The early years
Apediatric orthopedic surgeon at the Children’’s Hospital, W. T. Green, M.D., undertook a number of experiments in the early 1970’’s to generate new cartilage using chondrocytes seeded onto spicules of bone and implanted in nude mice. Although unsuccessful,
E-mail: cvacanti@PARTNERS.ORG

Reprinted from: Journal of Cellular and Molecular Medicine

doi:10.2755/jcmm010.003.20

he correctlyconcluded that with the advent of innovative biocompatible materials it would be possible to generate new tissue by seeding viable cells onto appropriately configured scaffolds. Several years later, Drs. Burke and Yannas of the Massachusetts General Hospital and M.I.T. collaborated in studies in both the laboratory and in humans to generate a tissue-engineered skin substitute using a collagen matrix...