The Expanding Frontiers of Stem Cells Therapy in Oral Maxillo-Facial Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine

Oral and Maxillo-facial tissue reconstruction has a high socioeconomic impact on patients and could compromise their quality of life because current approaches still have many limitations such as the inability to integrate complex and key biological structures, possess appropriate mechanical requirements, and a pro-regenerative immunomodulatory response. Moreover, infections still represent a major cause of healing failure, therefore preventive innovative strategies are highly required. So, innovative strategies aimed at oral maxillo-facial tissue engineering and regenerative medicine must meet these multidisciplinary needs to ensure greater success in clinical practice; in this view, stems cells and their derivates as well as bioactive materials influencing cells’ fate represent a very promising tool.

Advances in isolating and studying dental-derived mesenchymal stem cell (dMSC) biology, gene regulation, and intercellular interactions are promising for the evolution of therapeutic approaches in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. Novel stem cell/vesicle sources may be a promising tool for clinical application for a safe and effective application with biomaterials in order to boost their regenerative capabilities. Studies concerning the use of MSCs from different dental tissue sources for tissue engineering and regeneration will allow the translation of the knowledge that shall restore the patients ́ oral functionality of damaged oral maxilla-facial tissues and improve their rehabilitation and quality of life. The improvement of innovative bioactive biomaterials can represent another promising strategy to boost tissue healing by direct influencing dMSC fate, thus leading to faster healing as well as preventing inflammation and infection in situ by the release of targeted derivates such as extracellular vesicles.

Hence, we invite investigators to contribute with original articles that describe the regeneration and tissue repair process using innovative biological approaches (e.g. dental MSCs and/or their extracellular vesicles), thus contributing to clarify their interaction with oral tissues or their potential use with innovative multifunctional biomaterials, implant devices in as many models and contexts as possible and to encourage a clinical progression towards the cell-based or bioactive biomaterials translational research. Review articles describing your current knowledge about any aspect of regeneration and tissue engineering are also welcome.