The ability to direct cell behavior has been central to the success of numerous therapeutics to regenerate tissue or facilitate device integration. Biomaterial scientists are challenged to understand and modulate the interactions of biomaterials with biological systems in order to achieve effective tissue repair. One key area of research investigates the use of extracellular matrix‐derived ligands to target specific integrin interactions and induce cellular responses, such as increased cell migration, proliferation, and differentiation of mesenchymal stem cells. These integrin‐targeting proteins and peptides have been implemented in a variety of different polymeric scaffolds and devices to enhance tissue regeneration and integration. This review first presents an overview of integrin‐mediated cellular processes that have been identified in angiogenesis, wound healing, and bone regeneration. Then, research utilizing biomaterials are highlighted with integrin‐targeting motifs as a means to direct these cellular processes to enhance tissue regeneration. In addition to providing improved materials for tissue repair and device integration, these innovative biomaterials provide new tools to probe the complex processes of tissue remodeling in order to enhance the rational design of biomaterial scaffolds and guide tissue regeneration strategies.
The immune system plays a crucial role during tissue repair and wound healing processes. Biomaterials have been leveraged to assist in this in situ tissue regeneration process to dampen the foreign body response by evading or suppressing the immune system. An emerging paradigm within regenerative medicine is to use biomaterials to influence the immune system and create a pro-reparative microenvironment to instigate endogenously driven tissue repair. In this review, we discuss recent studies that focus on immunomodulation of innate and adaptive immune cells for tissue engineering applications through four biomaterial-based mechanisms of action: biophysical cues, chemical modifications, drug delivery, and sequestration. These materials enable augmented regeneration in various contexts, including vascularization, bone repair, wound healing, and autoimmune regulation. While further understanding of immune-material interactions is needed to design the next generation of immunomodulatory biomaterials, these materials have already demonstrated great promise for regenerative medicine.
The immune system plays an important role in tissue repair. Many biomaterial strategies have been used to promote tissue repair, and recent work in this area has looked into the possibility of doing repair by tuning. Thus, we examined the literature for recent works showcasing the efficacy of these approaches in animal models of injuries. In these studies, we found that biomaterials successfully tuned the immune response and improved the repair of various tissues. This highlights the promise of immune-modulating material strategies to improve tissue repair.
- NSF-PAR ID:
- 10372360
- Publisher / Repository:
- Springer Science + Business Media
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Regenerative Engineering and Translational Medicine
- Volume:
- 9
- Issue:
- 2
- ISSN:
- 2364-4133
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- p. 224-239
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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