Iranian researcher makes human cartilage from body cells
An Iranian researcher was able to produce human cartilage by sampling, proliferating and culturing human cartilage cells on a collagen protein scaffold. The plan’s executor, Mahdi Hadi, told ISNA that the production of human cartilage is one of his research achievements, adding the initial product was manufactured in the laboratory and it can be produced industrially as a medicinal product in the near future.
Elaborating on his project, Hadi said for human cartilage production, ¿rst the patient’s cartilage cells are sampled, then proliferated and cultured on a collagen protein scaffold, and ¿nally a full human cartilage is made during 30 days.
After the cartilage tissue is formed, various quality control tests are carried out on the sample, added the researcher who has worked at Royan Institute, an Iranian clinical, research and educational institute dedicated to biomedical, translational and clinical researches, stem cell research and infertility treatment.
“The tissue is valid and can be transplanted to the body if only it can pass the quality control stages and get a product identi¿cation.”
Hadi, who is currently working as the biological medicines director at To¿gh Daru Research and Engineering Company in Tehran, said the transplant is of the ‘autologous’ type, which is very important in terms of immune responses, because the patient’s body does not reject it.
In 2018, a product was produced by human cartilage in the US and entered the global market. However, being manufactured for each patient separately, it is very expensive, the researcher added.
Hadi further said his MS thesis, titled ‘The Effect of Pore Structure of Collagen Scaffold on Cultured Human Chondrocytes in Cartilage Tissue Engineering’ paved the way for developing this research project.
The thesis was then sponsored by Tamin Pharmaceutical Investment Company of Iran’s Social Security Organization and is being continued as a research project, he added.
“Recently I sent an article based on my thesis to the Second World Congress on Advanced Biomaterials and Tissue Engineering, and I was invited to Rome as the keynote speaker and the chairman of the congress’s Scienti¿c Committee.
“My project attracted some reputable pharmaceutical companies participating in the congress due to implementing innovative methods in research and having a better quality compared to its US counterpart.
To continue the plan abroad, many requests have been made by reputable pharmaceutical companies and Italian universities, but I prefer to bring this project to the country and help patients with severe cartilage injuries.”