Development of New Composite Tissue Allotransplantation Models using supermicrosurgery

Medical Care (Immunology, Transplantation Therapy, Regenerative Medicine, Reconstructive Surgery, Health Care Economy* Welfere and Politics and Military

Abstract

Currently, the composite tissue allotransplantation (CTA) is used clinically. However, side effects due to the immunosuppressant agents not for critical grafting become a major issue. Immunological tolerance introduced by the bone marrow transplantation (BMT) is an innovative therapy enabling long survival of a graft without immunosuppressant agents. We developed a new CTA model in order to apply the immunological tolerance introduction to the CTA. We prepared a rat lower limb transplantation model, a toe transplantation model, a forearm transplantation model, and mouse thigh chimera CTA model using supermicrosurgical technique. Additionally, we prepared a swine mandible CTA model in order to apply the technology to humans showing it is useful and with a wide clinical application. The CTA models developed by us do not include bones containing a lot of marrow (i.e., femur, humerus). They are superior CTA models that can evaluate the effect of immune tolerance by BMT.