Tissue graft
The present invention relates to a method of preparing a tissue graft material. The invention also relates to a multipurpose tissue graft material and to methods of using same as a replacement for vascular and non-vascular tissue.
1. A tissue graft produced by a method consisting essentially of the steps of:
i) washing a starting tissue obtained from a human or animal ureter with a bioburden reducing agent so that said starting tissue is disinfected,
ii) decellularizing the disinfected tissue resulting from step (i) with water or an aqueous hypotonic buffer that lyses cells of said disinfected tissue so that a tissue matrix is formed, and
iii) contacting said tissue matrix resulting from step (ii) with a nuclease so that nucleic acid associated with said tissue matrix is degraded, and
iv) washing said tissue matrix resulting from (iii) so that cellular or extracellular debris is removed and said tissue graft is produced.
2. The tissue graft according to claim 1 wherein, after step (iv), said tissue matrix is sterilized.
3. The tissue graft according to claim 1 wherein said tissue graft is cryopreserved.
4. The tissue graft according to claim 1 wherein said starting tissue is obtained from a bovine or porcine ureter.