Muscle tissue engineering

Abstract

Skeletal muscle is a classical example of structure determining function. Successful strategies for clinical applications of tissue-engineered skeletal muscle must recapitulate the processes that muscle undergoes during either embryonic development or adult regeneration. As discussed in this chapter, current approaches to tissue engineering of skeletal muscle broadly utilize different aspects of these processes, e.g. the generation of multinucleate, elongated myotubes (nascent myofibres) surrounded by a connective tissue sheath. The former are generated by encouraging muscle precursor cell fusion, in which alignment is vital, so that surface topography, fibre scaffolds and mechanical loading are key processes. Connective tissue sheaths can be generated by encasing constructs in materials such as collagen and fibrin. Finally, functional connections need to be made to the skeletal system via tendons, to the neural system via neuromuscular junctions and to the vascular system. The chapter that follows reviews the current situation as regards these developments. © 2009 Springer Berlin Heidelberg.