Engineered laryngeal cartilage for head and neck tissue reconstruction

To treat head and neck defects or pathological conditions, a cartilaginous grafting material is often needed. The reconstruction of cartilage defects is ideally performed with autologous grafting material, such as autologous cartilage. However, the use of autologous cartilage is limited by its finite availability and potentially suboptimal geometry to repair specific defects. Tissue engineering of cartilage may provide an adequate supply of autologous grafting and implant material for head and neck reconstructive and plastic surgery. The aim of this study was the optimization of a decellularization protocol for the porcine laryngeal cartilage, to obtain an acellular extra-cellular matrix (ECM) scaffold with potential applications for head and neck cartilage reconstruction. The study first assessed decellularization protocol efficacy, and then analyzed cytocompatiblity, ECM integrity and mechanical properties of the bioengineered scaffold.