Repair of Canine Mandibular Bone Defects with Bone Marrow Stromal Cells and Coral

Tissue engineering has become a new approach for repairing bone defects. Previous studies indicated that coral scaffolds had been utilized with bone marrow stromal cells (BMSCs) in a variety of approaches for bony reconstruction. In these applications, the degradation rate of the material did not match the rate at which bone was regenerated. In this study, a previously established 30 mm long mandibular segmental defect was repaired with engineered bone using green fluorescent protein–labeled osteogenic BMSCs seeded on porous coral ( n = 12). Defects treated with coral alone ( n = 12) were used as an experimental control. In the BMSCs/coral group, new bone formation was observed from 4 weeks postoperation, and bony-union was achieved after 32 postoperative weeks. The residual coral volume of the BMSCs/coral grafts at 12 weeks (20–30%) was significantly higher than that at 32 weeks (10–15%, p