autologous cultured cartilage

Autologous cultured cartilage (marketed as JACC in Japan) is an autologous cell therapy developed by Japan Tissue Engineering (J-TEC) for the treatment of knee joint cartilage defects. The therapy is prepared by harvesting a small amount of healthy cartilage tissue from the patient's own non-weight-bearing area of the knee joint, isolating the chondrocytes, and culturing them three-dimensionally within an atelocollagen gel scaffold. Once the cells have proliferated and matured, the resulting gel-like tissue-engineered product is surgically implanted into the patient's cartilage defect and secured with a membrane (such as an artificial collagen membrane or periosteum). JACC was approved in Japan in July 2012 for traumatic cartilage defects and osteochondritis dissecans of the knee, and its indication was expanded to include knee osteoarthritis in May 2025.

Brand names

JACC

Other names

Human Autologous Tissue for Transplantationautologous cultured chondrocytes in atelocollagen gel