19Matrix degradation has a major impact on the release kinetics of drug delivery 20 systems. Regarding ordered mesoporous silica materials for biomedical appli-21 cations, their dissolution is an important parameter that should be taken into 22 consideration. In this paper, we review the main factors that govern the 23 mesoporous silica dissolution in physiological environments. We also provide 24 the necessary knowledge to researchers in the area for tuning the dissolution 25 rate of those matrices, so the degradation could be controlled and the material 26 behaviour optimised. 27 28 29 Introduction 30 Ordered mesoporous silica materials (OMS) have 31 received great attention by the biomedical scientific 32 community since they were proposed for the first 33 time as drug delivery systems by the research group 34 headed by Vallet-Regí et al. [1]. Their unique struc-35 tural and textural properties, such as tuneable pore 36 structure, large surface area and pore volume, con-37 trollable pore diameter and morphology, and func-38 tionalisable surface, make OMS excellent candidates 39 to be applied as drug delivery devices in different 40 biomedical applications [2][3][4][5]. 41Initially, OMS were purposed as bioceramics for 42 local drug delivery and bone tissue regenerations due 43 to their surface characteristics, such as biocompati-44 bility and bioactivity, and their capability to load and 45 release in a controlled fashion different therapeutic 46 cargoes for the treatment of diverse pathologies 47 (Fig. 1,t o (Fig. 1, bottom), 56 underlining their systemic administration as 57 nanocarriers for diagnosis and treatment of complex 58 diseases such as cancer [20][21][22][23][24][25]. 59 The degradability of different drug delivery devi-60 ces is a key parameter for their successful translation 61 to a clinical scenario. In this sense, dissolution has 62 profound implications in the mechanical properties 63 of materials used for bone filling. Most importantly,