13^th Tissue Repair and Regeneration Congress

Biological Tissue Substitute

The repair or replacement of damaged skins is still an important, challenging problem. Immune acceptance and long-term existence of skin grafts represent the major problem to overawe in grafting given that in most situations auto grafts cannot be used. The rise of artificial skin substitutes provides alternate treatment with the ability to diminish the dependency on the growing demand of cadaver skin grafts. Over the years, considerable research efforts have focused on strategies for skin repair or permanent skin graft transplantations. Accessible skin substitutes include pre- or post-transplantation treatments of donor cells, stem cell-based therapies, and skin counterparts composed of bio-engineered cellular skin substitutes. However, skin substitutes are still prone to immunological rejection, and as such, there is currently no skin substitute available to overcome this phenomenon. This emphasis on the mechanisms of skin rejection and tolerance induction and outlines in detail current available tactics and alternatives that may allow achieving full-thickness skin replacement and repair.