Maxillary sinus membrane elevation is a common surgical technique for increasing bone height in the posterior maxilla prior to dental implant placement.
This surgery consists of lifting the maxillary Schneiderian sinus membrane and inserting the grafting material between local host bone and sinus mucosa, providing an increased bone volume in the maxillary sinus floor in order to allow placement of dental fixtures. Several studies have evaluated maxillary sinus augmentation using autogenous bone grafts and bone substitutes alone or in combination with autogenous bone.
Autogenous bone graft is considered as the “gold standard” for sinus floor augmentation because it possesses osteogenic, osteoinductive, and osteoconductive properties. Unfortunately, the harvest of autogenous bone requires an additional donor site surgery, which increases patient morbidity. To avoid such problems, a variety of allogenic and/or synthetic biomaterials have been used as bone graft substitutes. All of these materials function as osteoconductive scaffolds and possess the ability to form bone, but may exhibit a wide range of histological results. 
Several studies indicate that the simple lifting of the sinus membrane and creation of a void space might result in new bone owing to the principles of guided bone regeneration.
The aim of our presentation is to prove and validate the existence of an osteogenic progenitor cell population within 
the human maxillary Schneiderian sinus membrane and to demonstrate their potential for bone formation in an animal 
model in combination with scaffolds material. The clinical applications will be discussed.