Superior rheological properties lead to the complete filling of cartilage lesions via minimally invasive approaches. Our product has rheological properties, which govern the specific ways how materials deform or flow, that are advantageous for cartilage reconstruction. Perhaps the most notable is its low viscosity, which allows the use of Inkure®Cartilage with minimally invasive (arthroscopic) approaches that aim to bioprint cartilage tissue in situ (such as Cells for Cells’ ArthroPaint™). Importantly, these rheological features prevent the material’s clogging in small-diameter tubes and the spontaneous gelation of the hydrogel at room temperature. Moreover, given its effortless flow, surgeons using Inkure®Cartilage can completely fill the damaged area and avoid gaps between the reconstructed tissue and the surrounding cartilage, which is known to generate issues that can result in the procedure’s long-term failure.

Pores generated in vivo contribute to avoiding the need for scaffold post-processing outside the body. A substantial amount of scaffold porosity is often necessary to allow for homogeneous cell distribution and interconnection throughout engineered tissues. Increased porosity offers an ideal environment for cell adhesion, proliferation, and targeted differentiation due to higher diffusion of nutrients and oxygen, especially in the case of tissues such as cartilage that lack vasculature. Nevertheless, incorporating pores typically requires complex post-processing steps following scaffold formation. These post-processing steps cannot be conducted inside the body, so new pore-formating approaches were necessary. 

Inkure®Cartilage has controlled porosity due to the inclusion of novel customized porogenic elements designed to generate pores of deliberate size only after implantation. By incorporating these porogenic elements, we encourage chondrocyte migration to an environment where they can thrive and form new hyaline cartilage.