title: Recent Advances in Dendritic Macromonomers for Hydrogel Formation and Their Medical Applications.
abstract: Hydrogels represent one of the most important classes of biomaterials and are of interest for various medical applications including wound repair, tissue engineering, and drug release. Hydrogels possess tunable mechanical properties, biocompatibility, nontoxicity, and similarity to natural soft tissues. The need for hydrogels with specific properties, based on the design requirements of the in vitro, in vivo, or clinical application, motivates researchers to develop new synthetic approaches and cross-linking methodologies to form novel hydrogels with unique properties. The use of dendritic macromonomers represents one elegant strategy for the formation of hydrogels with specific properties. Specifically, the uniformity of dendrimers combined with the control of their size, architecture, density, and surface groups make them promising cross-linkers for hydrogel formation. Over the last two decades, a large variety of dendritic-based hydrogels are reported for their potential use in the clinic. This review describes the state of the art with these different dendritic hydrogel formulations including their design requirements, the synthetic routes, the measurement and determination of their properties, the evaluation of their in vitro and in vivo performances, and future perspectives.
authors.affiliation: Departments of Biomedical Engineering, Chemistry and Medicine, Boston University , 590 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, Massachusetts 02215, United States.
authors.forename: Cynthia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Ghobril
authors.affiliation: Carl J. Shapiro Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Harvard Medical School , Boston, Massachusetts, United States.
authors.forename: Edward K
authors.initials: EK
authors.lastname: Rodriguez
authors.affiliation: Center for Advanced Orthopaedic Studies, Carl J. Shapiro Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Harvard Medical School , Boston, Massachusetts, United States.
authors.forename: Ara
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Nazarian
authors.affiliation: Departments of Biomedical Engineering, Chemistry and Medicine, Boston University , 590 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, Massachusetts 02215, United States.
authors.forename: Mark W
authors.initials: MW
authors.lastname: Grinstaff
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001672:Biocompatible Materials / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D050091:Dendrimers / Q000737:chemistry*; D016503:Drug Delivery Systems; D006801:Humans; D020100:Hydrogels / Q000138:chemical synthesis / Q000737:chemistry / Q000627:therapeutic use; D023822:Tissue Engineering / Q000379:methods*; D014945:Wound Healing / Q000187:drug effects*
chemical_list: D001672:Biocompatible Materials; D050091:Dendrimers; D020100:Hydrogels