First Tissue Engineering Center
Tufts Daily reports that the first tissue engineering research center has been established at the Tufts Science and Technology Center. Tissue engineering is "an emerging multidisciplinary field involving biology, medicine, and engineering that is likely to revolutionize the ways we improve the health and quality of life for millions of people worldwide by restoring, maintaining, or enhancing tissue and organ function." The article gives a good example of an early practical result: recovery time for a torn anterior cruciate ligament in the knee can be reduced from six months to a year down to a few weeks by growing replacement tissue from bone marrow stem cells. Applying this sort of technology to more vital, complex organs is only a matter of time and funding.
Link: http://www.tuftsdaily.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2004/09/27/4157b31e5a261