Bioreactor non-invasively monitors changes in tissue

Tissue created this way might some day be used to replace damaged or diseased cartilage in the knee and hip, according to researchers at the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and project partners from the University of Colorado Boulder (CU).

According to a statement from NIST, conventional methods for evaluating the development and properties of engineered tissue are time consuming and destructive and need to be repeated many times.

By using ultrasound to monitor tissue during processing without destroying it, the novel bioreactor — a device for culturing cells to create engineered tissue — could be a faster and less expensive alternative.

‘Most bioreactors don’t do any type of non-destructive evaluation,’ said NIST postdoctoral researcher Jenni Popp, first author of a new paper about the instrument. ‘Having some sort of ongoing evaluation of the developing tissue is definitely novel.’

Cartilage is smooth connective tissue that supports joint motion and natural cartilage is created by specialised cells that generate large amounts of structural proteins to weave a tough support material called extracellular matrix.