Abstract
Regenerative medical therapy has been expected as the third therapy following the reconstructive surgery and organ transplantation to compensate for the technological and methodological disadvantages. There are three therapeutic objectives. The first is to create a new therapeutic strategy. The second is to enlarge the clinical applications of the conventional therapy. The third is to suppress the progressive deterioration of diseases. For every objective of regenerative therapy, basic idea is to induce and accelerate the regeneration and repairing of defective and damaged tissues based on the natural healing potential of patients them-selves. For the successful tissue regeneration and repairing, it is indispensable to provide cells with a local environment which enables them to efficiently proliferate and differentiate, resulting in cell-induced tissue regeneration. Biomaterials play an important role in the creation of this regeneration environment in terms of the cells scaffold of artificial extracellular matrix and the delivery technology of bio-signaling molecules to enhance the cells potential for tissue regeneration. In addition, biomaterials give cells culture conditions suitable for their in vitro proliferation and differentiation to obtain a large number of cells with a high quality for cell transplantation therapy. Cells can be genetically engineered to activate the biological functions by using the non-viral carrier of biomaterials. Several examples of in vivo tissue regeneration and basic researches for stem cells with the technology of cell scaffold and drug delivery system (DDS) of growth factors and genes are introduced to emphasize significance of biomaterials in the full realization of regenerative medical therapy.
