Crutches

Medical devices created by a spin-out company from the University of Cambridge are helping the body to heal itself.

Research that grew from a PhD project into a spin-out company provides the answer through its line of products for regenerative repair

In 2007, a staggering 2.5 million joint replacement procedures were performed worldwide. Although these operations are essential to ease pain and restore mobility, recuperation can be long and painful, and the prosthetic joints have a limited lifespan of no more than 17 years. For younger patients, this brings the unwanted prospect of further painful and expensive revision operations. Treatments are needed that can delay or even prevent joint replacement.

Research that grew from a PhD project into a spin-out company provides the answer through its line of products for regenerative repair. In 2001, Andrew Lynn embarked on a four-year product and preclinical development programme under the supervision of Professor William Bonfield at the Cambridge Centre for Medical Materials and funded by the Cambridge-MIT Institute. Working in collaboration with a team of colleagues from Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University, he developed advanced porous materials and structures that mimic important tissues found in the body, including those sites with interfaces between bone and soft tissue that are susceptible to traumatic injury.

By 2005, it was clear that the research had produced an effective novel solution that could be patent protected. Cambridge Enterprise filed the patent and licensed the technology to a newly created company ‘Orthomimetics’, and the following year the company raised over £5 million from institutional and private investors.

Orthomimetics has subsequently been awarded a further £2.1 million in grant funding to develop its technology and has made significant progress since its formation; it hopes to be selling its first product, Chondromimetic, next year following regulatory approval. The implant works by acting as a tissue regeneration scaffold that supports the body’s natural repair processes and is intended for cartilage repair following sports injuries and other orthopaedic trauma. By reducing the need for total joint replacement, products such as these will have a major impact on raising the standard of orthopaedic healthcare worldwide.

If you are an employee of the University and would like advice on the patentability and commercial opportunities for your invention, please contact Cambridge Enterprise (email: enquiries@enterprise.cam.ac.uk; Tel: +44 (0)1223 760339; www.enterprise.cam.ac.uk).


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