Development of innovative implantation patch for medical treatments of infertility

2015 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25560191
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Biomedical engineering/Biomaterial science and engineering
• Research Institution: The University of Tokyo
• Principal Investigator: Ushida Takashi 東京大学, 工学(系)研究科(研究院), 教授 (50323522)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): YOSHINO Osamu 富山大学, 大学院医学薬学研究部(医学), 准教授 (00466757) ; HIROTA Yasushi 東京大学, 医学部付属病院, 講師 (40598653) ; KISHIDA Akio 東京医科歯科大学, 生体材料工学研究所, 教授 (60224929) ; Furukawa Katsuko S 東京大学, 工学(系)研究科(研究院), 准教授 (90343144)
• Project Period (FY): 2013-04-01 – 2016-03-31
• Keywords: 子宮再生 / 脱細胞化担体

Outline of Final Research Achievements

With the advancement of women in society, women have gradually been wanting to have children at a later age. This dramatic life-style change has resulted in increased infertility, which has become a major problem. In vitro fertilization has made much progress and the success rate has reached the level of natural pregnancies. However, even if a good embryo can be produced, a proper environment for the embryo to attach is essential, and uterine defects are a major cause of failure of in vitro fertilization.
By considering the uterus to be a receptable for the embryo, we adopted a new perspective on uterus regeneration and engineered a novel "uterine embryo implantation patch". Uterine tissues harvested from animals were therefore decellularized, resulting in scaffolds with the same structural and mechanical properties as in vivo tissues. Furthermore, animal experiments showed that, one month after implantation, we had successfully reconstructed uterine tissues with a high pregnancy rate.

Free Research Field

再生医療工学