CUHK Passions and Pursuits

R egenerative medicine is the branch of modern biomedical technology that aims to repair or regenerate diseased or damaged tissues or organs of the human body. It encompasses the development of medical devices or artificial organs, tissue engineering, biomaterials, cellular therapies, and clinical translation. Prof. Rocky Tuan is a world- renowned biomedical scientist specializing in musculoskeletal biology and tissue regeneration. His seminal work on musculoskeletal tissues has scripted an important chapter in the big book of regenerative medicine. There are over 200 bones in a human adult. They serve two major functions, namely, weight-bearing and locomotion. The proper functioning of the bones and the joints ensures that human beings can carry on with their daily activities. Bones and joints, however, get damaged through injuries or degenerate with age, and the process is irreversible. Take osteoarthritis, for example. The disease, which results in the breakdown of the joint cartilage and the underlying bone, affects 10% to 15% of the population over 60. It is estimated that 130 million people worldwide would be affected by osteoarthritis by 2050. And there’s no cure for it. To mend the damaged joint, like repairing a pothole in the ground which requires concrete or asphalt as the filling material, the first step is to develop the material to replace the lost or damaged cartilage. In this case, the first raw material is human stem cells which can be found in many parts of the human body, such as bone marrow, fat tissue, muscle, placenta, and even baby teeth. Stem cells represent an ideal regenerative material because they have self-renewing power and the potential, when planted in a new tissue environment, to develop into cells that display the properties or functions relevant in that tissue. It is preferable that the stem cells for regenerative application come from the same person who is in need of a repaired or renewed tissue. Second, a scaffold or matrix is needed as a carrier for the cells to grow and develop into a reparative tissue. Professor Tuan has pioneered two 42