Extracellular vesicles from Hoffa´s fat pad- a new strategy for cartilage regeneration

As the incidence of osteoarthritis increased over the last years, development of new therapeutic approaches for osteochondral regeneration come into the focus of tissue engineering research. Besides conventional therapies using patient derived chondrocytes, stem cells became a promising cell source for cartilage repair due to their modulatory properties. But besides benefits of stem cell usage, also drawbacks occurred such as rejection of the cells after transplantation into the defect, teratoma formation or low differentiation capability of stem cells into the desired tissue. To circumvent these limitations, establishment of cell free approaches which comprise desired properties of stem cells are needed. Extracellular vesicles represent a novel mechanism by which signals are communicated among different cell types leading to cellular responses due to their cargo (e.g. proteins, lipids, mRNA,miRNA). It has already been described that extracellular vesicles isolated from body fluids as well as from cell conditioned media are potent mediators of therapeutic signals playing a role in a vast number of diseases including cancer, ischemia, sepsis, rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis among others. The focus of this project lies in evaluating the therapeutic potential of extracellular vesicles isolated from mesenchymal stem cells derived from the Hoffa´s fat pad on processes occurring during osteoarthritis (extracellular matrix degradation, inflammation). The Hoffa´s fat pad is located intra articularly behind and under the patellar. Due to its proximity to the cartilage, mesenchymal stem cells from this adipose tissue are more involved in the development and progression of osteoarthritis as mesenchymal stem cells derived from bone marrow which are often used for cartilage regeneration studies. In addition, the impact of blood derived products on Hoffa´s fat pad mesenchymal stem cells and their extracellular vesicles will be evaluated. Blood derived products such as platelet rich plasma (PRP) are often used in orthopedics with outstanding therapeutic efficacy. Utilization of the two blood derived products PRP and hyperacute serum as a cell culture supplement in order to replace conventionally used animal serum will also aid in translating findings obtained from cell culture experiments from bench to bedside.

Cooperation partners

• IMC University of Applied Sciences Krems
• Medical University Vienna
• OrthoSera