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Biomedische Technologie
Human Tissue Inc. -- The Challenges of Human Tissue Engineering?
Inter-departmental TU/e project [B-ID-BMT-TM-Wsk-...]
December 2004 - June 2005
From November 29, 2004, till June 2005 the Interdepartmental Project Human Tissue Inc. is running. The main collaborating departments in this project are: Architecture (B), Biomedical Engineering (BMT) and Industrial Design (ID). Students from these faculties will cooperate to design extra corporal structures inspired on (properties of) living tissues and using concepts and ideas from the new technology of tissue engineering. The principal focus is on ‘coverings’ based on skin, e.g. a clove (with properties) of living skin or moving architectures covered with skin-like structures.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
Proposed designs should be translated in realistic and (non)controversial products using concepts of Tissue Engineering. Tissue Engineering, being a multidisciplinary approach combining elements from Technical and Life Sciences, focuses on the creation of living tissues by seeding living cells on (temporary) carrier materials (scaffolds) and culturing them under prescribed conditions. Originally, tissue engineering is applied to design tissue substitutes for the repair or replacement of tissues and organs in the human body. For this purpose strict prerequisites can be given, such as the fact that the tissue must be cultured under standardized, a-septic conditions, and the fact that cells and scaffold should not evoke immune reactions in the human body. Also the cell source in of utmost importance. When applied for other purposes, such as for consumer products, building, or art, different prerequisites and guidelines may be applicable. In addition, the introduction of such products into the community may be controversial, evoking discussions regarding ethical and social aspects of using tissue engineering for the production of these items.
Students of Biomedical Engineering [BMT] will focus on the (im)possibilities of tissue engineering when students of Architecture [B] and Industrial Design [ID] create products for extra-corporal use. Guidelines and boundary conditions should be formulated for translating the proposed design into a realistic product that can be created via tissue engineering protocols. These may include the use of lasting or temporary scaffolds, the cell source, culture and growth conditions outside the human body, maintenance of the cultured tissue outside the body, guidelines for mechanical and failure properties of the desired and created (skin) tissues, remodeling of the created tissues with time, etc. For the translation of the concepts to larger scale constructions and mathematical models of architectural and industrial designs, students of Mathematics [Wsk] will joint the project, too. Furthermore, together with students from Technology Management [TM] ethical and social aspects of introducing the desired product into the community should be discussed. Will the product be accepted by the community; on what grounds; and how will it affect our daily live and vision on life? Can it be compared to the introduction of other new technologies in the past, etc?
The BME and TM students should combine everything in a set of guidelines, prescriptions and precautions that is to be handed over to the B and ID students. The work of the B and ID students will result in a concrete (proposal for a) design, or even in a prototype.