Engineering tissue alternatives to animals: applying tissue engineering to basic research and safety testing.

The focus for the rapid progress in the field of tissue engineering has been the clinical potential of the technology to repair, replace, maintain or enhance the function of a particular tissue or organ. However, tissue engineering has much wider applicability in basic research and safety testing, which is often not recognized owing to the clinical focus of tissue engineers. Using examples from a recent National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of Animals in Research/Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council symposium, which brought together tissue engineers and scientists from other research communities, this review highlights the potential of tissue engineering to provide scientifically robust alternatives to animals to address basic research questions and improve drug and chemical development in the pharmaceutical and chemical industries.