Bioreactors for Tissue Engineering

This chapter defines the concept of a bioreactor and the key roles of bioreactors in tissue engineering applications. It primarily focuses on their applications to 3D culture systems. It begins by the functions of bioreactors in three key processes of tissue engineering: cell seeding of porous scaffolds, maintaining adequate mass transport in the seeded constructs, and physical conditioning the developing tissues. The main functions of the bioreactor are to control the environmental conditions and the nutrient/product concentrations during the bioprocess. The level of control, reproducibility, and automation that an optimized bioreactor system enables is essential to manufacture products that must meet specific regulations and criteria regarding efficacy, safety, and quality, in addition to being cost-effective. Tissue engineering bioreactors are designed to enable the application of multiple regulatory signals to accommodate replicates via modular design and to provide biosensor or imaging compatibility.