T2 and Apparent Diffusion Coefficient of MRI Reflect Maturation of Tissue-Engineered Auricular Cartilage Subcutaneously Transplanted in Rats

摘要: In cartilage regenerative medicine, autologous chondrocyte implantation (ACI) has been applied clinically for partial defects of joint or nasal augmentation. To make treatment with ACI more effective and prevalent, modalities to evaluate the quality transplanted constructs noninvasively are necessary. this study, we compared efficacy several noninvasive evaluating maturation tissue-engineered auricular containing a biodegradable polymer scaffold. We first consisting human chondrocytes, atelocollagen gel, poly-l-lactic acid (PLLA) porous scaffold subcutaneously into back athymic nude rats. Eight weeks after transplantation, rats were examined by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), X-ray, ultrasound as modalities. Then, excised histological biochemical analysis including toluidine blue (TB) staining, glycosaminoglycans content, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay type II collagen. Among examined, transverse relaxation time (T2) apparent diffusion coefficient MRI showed quite high correlation results, suggesting that these can effectively detect cartilage. Since would realize time-course cartilage, study provides substantial insight improving leading improvement technique in medicine.