Sports Medicine Research Laboratory, Department of Orthopedic Surgery, Children's Hospital Boston, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA.
Tissue Eng Part B Rev. 2010 Feb;16(1):5-11. doi: 10.1089/ten.teb.2009.0147.
Translational research, which can be explained as the principle of combining advances in both basic research and clinical understanding in a bedside-to-bench-to-bedside approach, has become one of the central themes of present-day medical research. One orthopedic problem that has strongly benefited from such an approach is tissue-engineering-enhanced primary repair of the anterior cruciate ligament. Recent years have shown a clearer definition of the clinical problem and established an underlying mechanistic cause of the incapacity of the anterior cruciate ligament to heal-the premature loss of provisional scaffold in the wound site. These clinical findings were then translated into a research objective, namely, to replace the missing scaffold with a biomaterial with appropriate structural and bio-stimulatory characteristics. Subsequently, a tissue-engineering-based treatment using a collagen-platelet composite was developed and tested in vitro. After proofing the efficacy of this new treatment in the laboratory, it was translated into a potential clinical application, which showed highly successful results in structural integrity and biomechanical capacity in large animal testing. This approach of defining the scientific mechanism underlying a clinical observation and then using that information to design new therapies is but one example of how translational research in tissue engineering can help define and develop new treatments for challenging problems faced by patients.
转化研究可以解释为将基础研究和临床理解方面的进展结合起来的原则，采用从床边到实验室再到床边的方法，已经成为当今医学研究的核心主题之一。组织工程增强的前交叉韧带初次修复就是从这种方法中受益的一个骨科问题。近年来，人们对临床问题有了更清晰的定义，并确定了前交叉韧带无法愈合的潜在机制原因——在伤口部位临时支架过早丢失。这些临床发现随后被转化为一个研究目标，即用具有适当结构和生物刺激特性的生物材料替代缺失的支架。随后，开发了一种基于组织工程的使用胶原-血小板复合物的治疗方法，并在体外进行了测试。在实验室证明了这种新治疗方法的有效性后，将其转化为一种潜在的临床应用，在大型动物试验中显示出了在结构完整性和生物力学能力方面非常成功的结果。这种定义临床观察背后的科学机制的方法，然后利用这些信息设计新的治疗方法，只是组织工程转化研究如何帮助定义和开发患者面临的具有挑战性问题的新治疗方法的一个例子。
