Osteoarthritis is one of the most prominent medical and social problems of the modern society affecting nearly half of the aged population in the developed world.
This is a complex disease driven by chronic inflammatory and degenerative mechanisms involving the immune system, stromal tissues of the joint capsule and also cartilage cells. Cartilage cells form a highly specialized layer in the synovial joints such as the knee, and these cells have very limited regenerative capacity further decreasing with aging. Our studies using cells, and also small and large animal models of osteoarthritis and posttraumatic joint injury, showed a strongly significant decline in degenerative process when animals were treated with our drugs; moreover, we were able to definitively demonstrate regeneration of already-damaged and degraded tissues.