Calcifying tissue regeneration via biomimetic materials chemistry

Abstract

Materials chemistry is making a fundamental impact in regenerative sciences providing many platforms for tissue development. However, there is a surprising paucity of replacements that accurately mimic the structure and function of the structural fabric of tissues or promote faithful tissue reconstruction. Methodologies in biomimetic materials chemistry have shown promise in replicating morphologies, architectures and functional building blocks of acellular mineralized tissues dentine, enamel and bone or that can be used to fully regenerate them with integrated cell populations. Biomimetic materials chemistry encompasses the two processes of crystal formation and mineralization of crystals into inorganic formations on organic templates. This review will revisit the successes of biomimetics materials chemistry in regenerative medicine, including coccolithophore simulants able to promote in vivo bone formation. In-depth knowledge of biomineralization throughout evolution informs the biomimetic materials chemist of the most effective techniques for regenerative framework construction exemplified via exploitation of liquid crystals (LCs) and complex self-organizing media. Therefore, a new innovative direction would be to create chemical environments that perform reaction–diffusion exchanges as the basis for building complex biomimetic inorganic structures. This has evolved widely in biology, as have LCs, serving as self-organizing templates in pattern formation of structural biomaterials. For instance, a study is highlighted in which artificially fabricated chiral LCs, made from bacteriophages are transformed into a faithful copy of enamel. While chemical-based strategies are highly promising at creating new biomimetic structures there are limits to the degree of complexity that can be generated. Thus, there may be good reason to implement living or artificial cells in ‘morphosynthesis’ of complex inorganic constructs. In the future, cellular construction is probably key to instruct building of ultimate biomimetic hierarchies with a totality of functions.

Advancing biomaterials of human origin for tissue engineering

“…In particular, the addition of natural components, with their natural ratios, into synthetic polymers, followed by the incorporation of biochemical and biophysical cues, mirroring the chemistry as well as the nanofibrous network of the native matrix, has emerged as a leading strategy in scaffolding design [52,89]. Such materials chemistry has made a fundamental and an increasingly crucial impact on materials science, showing significant promise in replicating the morphologies, nanostructures and functional building blocks of a large variety of human tissues or in fully recreating these building blocks using integrated reparative cell populations [90]. …”

“…Unfortunately, however, there has been a surprising paucity of biomaterial templates that are designed to accurately mimic the architectures and functions of the structural fabric of native tissues, ensuring precise tissue regeneration [90]. Indeed, physical attributes, such as scaffold shape, size, architecture, structure, mechanics, porosity, surface texture and com-partmentalization, can profoundly affect the biological functions of biomaterials once they are placed into an in vivo cellular microenvironment [33,34].…”

Engineering a Cell Home for Stem Cell Homing and Accommodation

“…In addition, structural solid‐state ECM molecules may serve as reservoirs for the storage and protection of secreted signals for their subsequent on‐demand release . Advances in bioinspired design and material chemistries have broadened our knowledge of the use of a myriad of biophysical and biochemical ECM cues for cell fate determination and have enabled the development of improved regenerative biomaterials that mimic the organized and intricate meshwork of the native ECM at the nanoscale level . Even with significant progress in biomaterials engineering for cellular control, particular challenges exist when using these biomaterials for in situ tissue‐engineering and regeneration applications.…”

“…The ability to control multiple biochemical and mechanical cues independently to analyze their relative and combined influences on stem cell potential accompanied by phenotypic alterations would be desirable. In this context, material parameters, such as wettability, surface chemistry, geometry, topography and indentation elastic modulus of all polymer‐based matrices within a spatiotemporal context, can be quantified using novel biotechniques (e.g., high‐throughput methods and microfluidics) to establish structure‐function correlations between biological performance and biomaterial properties . Specifically, the mechanical and biochemical properties of an adult neural stem cell microenvironment can be tuned for cell regulation.…”

Preparation and applications of self-assembled natural and synthetic nanostructures

“…They can also support soft tissues during tooth replacement or cornea replacement (Singh and Levi, 2014;Alliston, 2014;Fernandez-Yague et al, 2015;James et al, 2014;Kikuchi et al, 2001;Pylaev et al, 2011;Reznikov et al, 2014;Wang et al, 2010Wang et al, , 2014Yamamoto et al, 2014;Almqvist et al, 1999;Green et al, 2014). The mechanical properties exhibited by nanostructure, such as Young's modulus of 2.5 GPa and 40 MPa bending strength, are similar to autogenous cancellous bone that make it suitable as composite material for bone grafts.…”