Ebook: Developing Insights in Cartilage Repair

This comprehensive book discusses cartilage repair and all its aspects. These aspects vary from basic insights in cartilage biology and regeneration via MRI, to results of existing cartilage repair techniques and upcoming novel approaches. Fundamental cartilage biology is the topic covered within the first chapters of the book. These chapters not only provide an insight in healthy, damaged and regenerative cartilage but also describe developments in gene therapy and methods to enhance chondrogenesis of stemcells and prevent hypertophic differentiation. There is a huge progress in the possibilities of MR imaging of both healthy, damaged and regenerative cartilage. These developments not only enable better monitoring of cartilage repair but may also unravel the pathophysiology of the development of cartilage defects. Different cartilage repair techniques (e.g. allografts, autologous chondrocytes transplantation [ACT], microfracture), there technical aspects (e.g. developments towards an total arthroscopic approach), pitfalls, and outcomes are reported in the following chapters. In these chapters factors important for the results of cartilage repair such as meniscal repair, patient factors are described. Finally, an overview of novel cartilage repair techniques such as minced cartilage, denovo cartilage and more areas are discussed in this comprehensive addition to the literature.

This book reviews the current basic and clinical research into the mechanisms of cartilage injury and its management. It illustrates the considerable progress made in the search for solutions to cartilage related problems.

Developing Insights in Cartilage Repair describes fundamental research and the use of biomaterials, bioreactors, and imaging as part of existing cartilage repair strategies, while revealing the on-going trends for emerging techniques. The aim of the Editors and their team of authorities in cartilage medicine has been to provide a link between laboratory work and the daily treatment of patients in a clinical setting. This book reveals the highly multidisciplinary nature of the topic and it will thus not only be of considerable interest to a large proportion of the orthopaedic community, but also any discipline in which cartilaginous tissue is involved, including otorhinolaryngology and plastic surgery.

· Provides an insight of cartilage and its repair to physicians and scientists with an active interest in cartilage repair and new transplantation techniques

· Describes different strategies to repair cartilage defects as well as fundamental research concerning cartilage biology and imaging

· Up-to-date research enables fast clinical implementation of novel findings to optimize cartilage repair