UC Science Today

Osteoarthritis is the aging and wearing of cartilage in the joints of your hands, knees, hips and spine. If severe enough in the knee, it may even require replacement surgery. While current techniques typically use metal or plastic replacement joints, Dr. Grace O’Connell’s biomechanics lab at the University of California, Berkeley is growing cartilage tissue in hopes of developing a biological solution.

"We’ve been able to grow very small discs of cartilage, about four millimeters in diameter. But your knee is a lot bigger than that. So if you want something that’s clinically relevant, at the minimum, you want something that’s about an inch in diameter. And so we’ve developed a way of growing smaller pieces and then, in a sense gluing them together with native matrix to make a larger surface."

O’Connell says that being able to engineer larger cartilage tissue holds promise for future clinical application.

"Instead of replacing the entire knee joint with metal and plastic components, you could then replace just the damaged cartilage with a biological replace strategy."

Osteoarthritis is the aging and wearing of cartilage in the joints of your hands, knees, hips and spine. If severe enough in the knee, it may even require replacement surgery. While current techniques typically use metal or plastic replacement joints, Dr. Grace O’Connell’s biomechanics lab at the University of California, Berkeley is growing cartilage tissue in hopes of developing a biological solution.

"We’ve been able to grow very small discs of cartilage, about four millimeters in diameter. But your knee is a lot bigger than that. So if you want something that’s clinically relevant, at the minimum, you want something that’s about an inch in diameter. And so we’ve developed a way of growing smaller pieces and then, in a sense gluing them together with native matrix to make a larger surface."

O’Connell says that being able to engineer larger cartilage tissue holds promise for future clinical application.

"Instead of replacing the entire knee joint with metal and plastic components, you could then replace just the damaged cartilage with a biological replace strategy."

Osteoarthritis is the aging and wearing of cartilage in the joints of your hands, knees, hips and spine. If severe enough in the knee, it may even require replacement surgery. While current techniques typically use metal or plastic replacement joints, Dr. Grace O’Connell’s biomechanics lab at the University of California, Berkeley is growing cartilage tissue in hopes of developing a biological solution.

"We’ve been able to grow very small discs of cartilage, about four millimeters in diameter. But your knee is a lot bigger than that. So if you want something that’s clinically relevant, at the minimum, you want something that’s about an inch in diameter. And so we’ve developed a way of growing smaller pieces and then, in a sense gluing them together with native matrix to make a larger surface."

O’Connell says that being able to engineer larger cartilage tissue holds promise for future clinical application.

"Instead of replacing the entire knee joint with metal and plastic components, you could then replace just the damaged cartilage with a biological replace strategy."

Back in 1975, climate scientist V. ‘Ram’ Ramanathan of the University of California, San Diego accurately predicted how the earth’s climate would change by 2010. And while his climate model chart continued to show further warming, Ramanathan says we can ‘bend the curve’ in this chart if we take collective measures now.

"We have the science and we have the technology. This is where the intitiatives taken in California could shine a brightest light possible on this problem. The Carbon Neutrality Initiative of the University of California, through which we would go to nearly zero emissions another ten years and then combine that with the state of California’s aggressive actions to mitigate climate change by using solar fuel cells and waste gas can provide like a beacon for the nation and for the planet to follow."

Back in 1975, climate scientist V. ‘Ram’ Ramanathan of the University of California, San Diego accurately predicted how the earth’s climate would change by 2010. And while his climate model chart continued to show further warming, Ramanathan says we can ‘bend the curve’ in this chart if we take collective measures now.

"We have the science and we have the technology. This is where the intitiatives taken in California could shine a brightest light possible on this problem. The Carbon Neutrality Initiative of the University of California, through which we would go to nearly zero emissions another ten years and then combine that with the state of California’s aggressive actions to mitigate climate change by using solar fuel cells and waste gas can provide like a beacon for the nation and for the planet to follow."

Back in 1975, climate scientist V. ‘Ram’ Ramanathan of the University of California, San Diego accurately predicted how the earth’s climate would change by 2010. And while his climate model chart continued to show further warming, Ramanathan says we can ‘bend the curve’ in this chart if we take collective measures now.

"We have the science and we have the technology. This is where the intitiatives taken in California could shine a brightest light possible on this problem. The Carbon Neutrality Initiative of the University of California, through which we would go to nearly zero emissions another ten years and then combine that with the state of California’s aggressive actions to mitigate climate change by using solar fuel cells and waste gas can provide like a beacon for the nation and for the planet to follow."

Back in 1975, climate scientist V. ‘Ram’ Ramanathan of the University of California, San Diego accurately predicted how the earth’s climate would change by 2010. And while his climate model chart continued to show further warming, Ramanathan says we can ‘bend the curve’ in this chart if we take collective measures now.

"We have the science and we have the technology. This is where the intitiatives taken in California could shine a brightest light possible on this problem. The Carbon Neutrality Initiative of the University of California, through which we would go to nearly zero emissions another ten years and then combine that with the state of California’s aggressive actions to mitigate climate change by using solar fuel cells and waste gas can provide like a beacon for the nation and for the planet to follow."

Could shape-shifting rovers lead the next generation of space exploring robots? A collaborative team led by NASA Ames and the University of California, Berkeley is designing a spherical prototype modeled after tensegrity structures, in which isolated rods are held together by elastomers that allow them to easily change shape and absorb forces after impact. Study leader Alice Agogino explains.

"So these robots are spherical, and so they are amazing little walking spheres. And none of the compressive elements or the rods touch each other, so it gives us a structure that can take a lot of impact. We can make it have shape-shifting motion, which allows us to change the center of gravity to make it flop over and walk, basically."

Agogino says that the tensegrity prototype would be cheaper and more efficient than traditional rovers.

"We want rovers that are so small that could be packed so we could put multiple rovers in a space ship, and reduce the cost and improve the efficiency of space exploration."

Could shape-shifting rovers lead the next generation of space exploring robots? A collaborative team led by NASA Ames and the University of California, Berkeley is designing a spherical prototype modeled after tensegrity structures, in which isolated rods are held together by elastomers that allow them to easily change shape and absorb forces after impact. Study leader Alice Agogino explains.

"So these robots are spherical, and so they are amazing little walking spheres. And none of the compressive elements or the rods touch each other, so it gives us a structure that can take a lot of impact. We can make it have shape-shifting motion, which allows us to change the center of gravity to make it flop over and walk, basically."

Agogino says that the tensegrity prototype would be cheaper and more efficient than traditional rovers.

"We want rovers that are so small that could be packed so we could put multiple rovers in a space ship, and reduce the cost and improve the efficiency of space exploration."

Could shape-shifting rovers lead the next generation of space exploring robots? A collaborative team led by NASA Ames and the University of California, Berkeley is designing a spherical prototype modeled after tensegrity structures, in which isolated rods are held together by elastomers that allow them to easily change shape and absorb forces after impact. Study leader Alice Agogino explains.

"So these robots are spherical, and so they are amazing little walking spheres. And none of the compressive elements or the rods touch each other, so it gives us a structure that can take a lot of impact. We can make it have shape-shifting motion, which allows us to change the center of gravity to make it flop over and walk, basically."

Agogino says that the tensegrity prototype would be cheaper and more efficient than traditional rovers.

"We want rovers that are so small that could be packed so we could put multiple rovers in a space ship, and reduce the cost and improve the efficiency of space exploration."