Renovation of the injured heart with myocardial tissue engineering.

Tissue engineering aims to create, repair and/or replace tissues and organs by using cells, scaffolds, biologically active molecules and physiologic signals. It is an interdisciplinary field that integrates aspects of engineering, chemistry, biology and medicine. One of the most challenging goals in the field of cardiovascular tissue engineering is the creation of a heart muscle patch. This review describes the principles, achievements and challenges of achieving this ambitious goal of creating contractile heart muscle. In addition, the new strategy of in situ and injectable tissue engineering for myocardial repair and regeneration is presented.