To Engineer an Eardrum
Tissue engineers are, by necessity, starting with the less complex jobs - which in and of itself is still a list of impressive feats that will greatly improve medicine and health. Via POST Newspapers: scientists are "closer to growing artificial eardrums to replace those damaged by explosions, trauma and infection. Already they have been the first in the world to successfully harvest and grow eardrum cells - called keratinocytes - in a test tube. ... In the next five years we hope to be able to replace a hole in an eardrum with a functional, artificial eardrum ... This would be done by taking a small piece of a patient's own damaged eardrum tissue - to reduce chances of later rejection - and from it growing new cells on a mesh in the laboratory ... Within a few weeks, the new tissue could be given to a surgeon who could use it to patch the hole."
Link: http://www.postnewspapers.com.au/20060422/news/006.shtml