Daniel B. F. Saris, MD, PhD, the inaugural recipient of the Arnold I. Caplan Award for Distinguished Research in Orthobiologics, will be recognized at the AAOS 2025 Annual Meeting in San Diego during the Your Academy event, from 9:30 to 10:30 a.m. on Wednesday, March 12, in Room 20BC.
Published 2/26/2025
AAOS announced Daniel B. F. Saris, MD, PhD, as the inaugural recipient of the Arnold I. Caplan Award for Distinguished Research in Orthobiologics (Caplan Award). This prestigious recognition celebrates the legacy of Arnold I. Caplan, PhD, a pioneer in the field of orthobiologics and medicinal signaling cells (MSCs), by honoring his significant contributions over a span of more than five decades to advancing biologics solutions for musculoskeletal injuries or pathologies.
The Caplan Award recognizes Dr. Saris for the development and testing of the knee joint restoration procedure RECLAIM (Recycled Cartilage Auto/Allo Implantation). The RECLAIM procedure debrides the patient’s knee defect by removing cartilage from the knee or hip, mincing the pieces into smaller fragments, and extracting cartilage cells through chemical digestion to the level of the chondron. The recycled autologous chondrons are combined with allogeneic donor MSCs and injected into the patient’s knee defect with a mixture of the patient’s cells. This procedure enables the patient’s body to repair the cartilage defect, something it otherwise would be unable to do.
“Dr. Caplan’s work opened a new terrain of therapeutic options. My research carries on from his legacy by demonstrating that combining native cartilage cells and allogeneic MSCs can be a good partnership,” said Dr. Saris, who is a professor of orthopaedics and regenerative medicine at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and professor of reconstructive surgery at the University Medical Center Utrecht in the Netherlands. “We were able to show that it is possible to recycle a patient’s own cartilage if you add donor MSCs to the mix. The donor MSCs clean the environment, and the growth factors allow the patient’s own cartilage to grow. Our clinical work proved what Dr. Caplan discovered is actually possible in the human knee.”
Jason L. Dragoo, MD, FAAOS, chair of the AAOS Committee on Devices, Biologics, and Technology, praised Dr. Saris’ research for its potential long-term impact on patient care: “Dr. Caplan laid the groundwork by revolutionizing our understanding of MSCs and their therapeutic uses. Now, Dr. Saris and his team are taking that foundational lab research and advancing it further, showing the same innovative spirit in their mission to improve patients’ quality of life.”
The Caplan Award, created through the generosity of the Caplan family with funding overseen by the Orthopaedic Research and Education Foundation, recognizes excellence in orthobiologics research. The award includes a desktop recognition piece and a $10,000 monetary prize. Dr. Saris will be honored at the AAOS 2025 Annual Meeting in San Diego during the Your Academy event, from 9:30 to 10:30 a.m. on Wednesday, March 12, in Room 20BC.
For more information about AAOS’ investment in evidence-based educational orthobiologics content, visit aaos.org/quality.