title: Approaches to synthetic platelet analogs.
abstract: Platelet transfusion is routinely used for treating bleeding complications in patients with hematologic or oncologic clotting disorders, chemo/radiotherapy-induced myelosuppression, trauma and surgery. Currently, these transfusions mostly use allogeneic platelet concentrates, while products like lyophilized platelets, cold-stored platelets and infusible platelet membranes are under investigation. These natural platelet-based products pose considerable risks of contamination, resulting in short shelf-life (3-5 days). Recent advances in pathogen reduction technologies have increased shelf-life to ~7 days. Furthermore, natural platelets are short in supply and also cause several biological side effects. Hence, there is significant clinical interest in platelet-mimetic synthetic analogs that can allow long storage-life and minimum side effects. Accordingly, several designs have been studied which decorate synthetic particles with motifs that promote platelet-mimetic adhesion or aggregation. Recent refinement in this design involves combining the adhesion and aggregation functionalities on a single particle platform. Further refinement is being focused on constructing particles that also mimic natural platelet's shape, size and elasticity, to influence margination and wall-interaction. The optimum design of a synthetic platelet analog would require efficient integration of platelet's physico-mechanical properties and biological functionalities. We present a comprehensive review of these approaches and provide our opinion regarding the future directions of this research.
authors.affiliation: Case Western Reserve University, Department of Biomedical Engineering, Cleveland, OH 44106, USA.
authors.forename: Christa L
authors.initials: CL
authors.lastname: Modery-Pawlowski
authors.forename: Lewis L
authors.initials: LL
authors.lastname: Tian
authors.forename: Victor
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Pan
authors.forename: Keith R
authors.initials: KR
authors.lastname: McCrae
authors.forename: Samir
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mitragotri
authors.forename: Anirban
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Sen Gupta
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D058045:Artificial Cells / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000166:cytology*; D040761:Biomimetic Materials / Q000737:chemistry; D032701:Biomimetics / Q000379:methods*; D001792:Blood Platelets / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000166:cytology*; D006487:Hemostasis; D006801:Humans