Injection system for cellular assembly of 3D bio-tissue engineered constructs

Tissue engineering is an emerging discipline which seeks to overcome many of the limitations of current surgical approaches for the treatment of tissue and organ loss. The approach utilises patient derived biological tissue replacements. Traditional tissue engineering approaches involve the seeding of suspended single cells onto the surface of a 3D porous bio-material, where the seeded construct is incubated for a period of time before implantation back into the patient. A number of limitations exist with this approach which include low cell seeding density and the inability for accurate spatial control of cellular distribution within the construct. A novel approach pursued in our lab addresses these limitations, and an automated robotic system is currently being developed for the procedure. A key subsystem for the automation of the process is the injection system, which expands a pore before particle delivery ensuring particle containment. Results have given great insight into the various aspects involved with the injection process and proof of concept has been established.