Award for innovative research on cartilage engineering

Around 8.5 million individuals in the UK suffer from osteoarthritis, which is a progressive debilitating joint disease that mostly affects articular cartilage (smooth, white tissue that covers the ends of bones in joints enabling easy movement). "Articular cartilage can be described as the shock absorber between bones which helps joints move freely, says Siwei. "However, unlike bone, cartilage has limited self-repair ability and surgery is needed when articular cartilage is damaged in accidents or as a result of old age. We are looking at better ways to treat articular cartilage damage using tissue engineered 3-D cartilage grafts of human articular chondrocytes (cartilage cells) and stem cells from adult human bone marrow."

The researcher is reaching the end of his PhD study into cartilage tissue engineering. He is using leftover cellular material from hip replacement operations to build a ‘cartilage bandage' that can be used to ‘resurface' damaged articular cartilage in early stage osteoarthritis. Although this research is in its early stages, it has tremendous potential as a future treatment for this common condition.

Siwei is supervised by Dr Rahul Tare and Professor Richard Oreffo from the Bone and Joint Research Group; his research was carried out in collaboration with Dr Peter Glynne-Jones and Professor Martyn Hill from Engineering Sciences. "Solving these problems needs researchers from different disciplines to come together," he adds. "It is very satisfying to work in an area that could bring benefits for many patients."

_{*His research paper was entitled: ‘Application of a novel perfusion bioreactor with integrated ultrasound standing wave trap for augmentation of cartilage tissue engineering}.'