[Regenerative medicine in orthopaedics. Cell therapy - tissue engineering - in situ regeneration]

Therapeutic approaches in regenerative medicine, irrespective of specific fields, comprise cell therapy, tissue engineering and in situ regeneration. Regenerative orthopaedics often leads the way on the path to clinical application. In cell therapy primary cells could be replaced by adult mesenchymal stem cells exhibiting almost unlimited regeneration capacity. More sophisticated biomaterial design allowing specific control of cell morphology and tissue organisation is the current focus of advancements in tissue engineering, while signalling to cells by intelligent biomaterials is a main focus of in situ regeneration. These new approaches to the reconstruction of structures and function in damaged or dysfunctional tissue will make it more often possible to achieve a sustainable improvement in terms of real regeneration rather than an acceptable repair.