The center has set up an array of key programs involving gristle, tendon and skin. On the basis of effective research results, the center's experts have experimented on human bodies in clinics.

Tissue engineering is dedicated to the production and regeneration of human tissues, which will make non-self tissue transplant an old story and usher in a new era of cloning a person's own tissue.

Cao Yilin, director of the center, headed a research team which succeeded in producing human ear-shaped gristle on rats by using tissue engineering techniques.

The center was jointly set up by the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Science and Technology and a number of local prestigious medical universities and research institutes.

(People's Daily 01/29/01)