Tissue Engineering in Traumatic Brain Injuries

Abstract

If the brain is injured due to traumatic brain injury (TBI), it will lose some of its cells. If our brain cells get damaged, we may be left with problems controlling our movement, our speech, or even our memory! In the future, tissue engineering may be able to help people with TBI. Tissue engineering involves building a piece of tissue outside of the body or assisting the damaged part of a tissue to grow again and function inside the body. Cells are the building blocks of the body, and they are surrounded by a matrix that supports them. This matrix is called the extracellular matrix (ECM). Scientists can make artificial mimics of the natural ECM. The artificial ECM helps a damaged tissue to regenerate. In this article, we discuss how Gel-MA, an artificial ECM, can have healing properties in injured brains.