13:15
The use of tissue engineered implants could facilitate unions in situations where there is loss of bone or non-union, thereby increasing healing time, reducing the risk of infections and hence reducing morbidity. Currently engineered bone tissue is not of sufficient quality to be used in widespread clinical practice. In order to improve experimental design, and thereby the quality of the tissue-constructs, the underlying biological processes involved need to be better understood. In conjunction with experimentalists, we consider the effect hydrodynamic pressure has on the development and regulation of bone, in a bioreactor designed specifically for this purpose. To answer the experimentalists’ specific questions, we have developed two separate models; in this talk I will present one of these, a multiphase partial differential equation model to describe the evolution of the cells, extracellular matrix that they deposit, the culture medium and the scaffold. The model is then solved using the finite element method using the deal.II library.