Injectable Nanocomposite Hydrogels for Cancer Therapy

Abstract

Hydrogel is a kind of 3D polymer network with strong swelling ability in water and appropriate mechanical and biological properties, which make it feasible to maintain bioactive substances and has promising applications in the fields of biomaterials, soft machines, and artificial tissues. Unfortunately, traditional hydrogels prepared by chemical crosslinking have poor mechanical properties and limited functions, which limit their further application. In recent years, with the continuous development of nanoparticle research, more and more studies have combined nanoparticles with hydrogels to make up for the shortcomings of traditional hydrogels. In this article, the types and functions of hydrogels and nanomaterials are introduced first, as well as the functions and applications of injectable nanocomposite hydrogels (INHs), then the latest progress of INHs for cancer treatment is reviewed, some existing problems are summarized, and the application prospect of NHs is prospected.

A Bibliometric and Visual Analysis of Nanocomposite Hydrogels Based on VOSviewer From 2010 to 2022

“…Keyword co-occurrence analysis reflected the developing trends and hot spots of NHs (Figure 8). Due to the special construction and physical properties of NHs we mentioned above, the hot spots are in vitro drug delivery of NHs, injectable hydrogels, and the application of 3D printing, especially in the simulation of bone (Asadi et al, 2018;Gorantla et al, 2019;Du et al, 2021;Shahid et al, 2021;Syed Azhar et al, 2022). The keywords appearing in Figure 8 are connected closely and have strong centrality, which shows that the application of NHs has developed to different orientations continually and rapidly (Motealleh et al, 2021a).…”

“…For instance, the introduction of nanomaterials in NHs improves the material area ratio, providing more adhesion sites for protein ( Motealleh and Kehr, 2017 ; Mellati et al, 2021 ). Therefore, it is recognized by some researchers as a highly efficient choice for drug carriers, whether via in vivo or in vitro delivery routes ( Kehr et al, 2015 ; Du et al, 2021 ). In addition, NHs also have outstanding biomimetic properties and histocompatibility, so they can place some special tissues for clinical treatment, such as cartilage, skeletal muscle, and cardiac tissues ( Asadi et al, 2018 ; Piantanida et al, 2019 ; Zhao et al, 2020 ; Peper et al, 2021 ; Wang et al, 2021 ).…”

Recent Development of Conductive Hydrogels for Tissue Engineering: Review and Perspective

“…Injectable hydrogels, as the carrier of biomacromolecules and cells, have been widely applied in the biomedical field, especially for drug delivery and tissue engineering. [95,96] Usually, stimuli-responsive property and dynamic crosslinking strategy were adopted to synthesize injectable hydrogels, in order to ensure their shear thinning and rapid gelation properties at physiological environment. [97,98] Due to the fluidity during injecting, hydrogel patches could be perfectly filled in the irregular defected positions, effectively avoiding infection and secondary complication after the surgery.…”

Recent advances in smart‐responsive hydrogels for tissue repairing

“…To address the limitations of current drug delivery, hydrogels hold superior promise for in situ treatment of brain tissue‐damaging diseases 143 . Considering the microenvironmental characteristics of brain tissue injury sites (such as acidic pH, platelet activation, ROS concentration, and enzyme concentration), some smart‐responsive hydrogel‐based strategies have been used for brain injury tissue repair 143,144 . In addition to stimuli from internal factors, external stimuli such as magnetic fields, electric fields, ultrasound, and light are also possible 129 .…”

“…143 Considering the microenvironmental characteristics of brain tissue injury sites (such as acidic pH, platelet activation, ROS concentration, and enzyme concentration), some smart-responsive hydrogel-based strategies have been used for brain injury tissue repair. 143,144 In addition to stimuli from internal factors, external stimuli such as magnetic fields, electric fields, ultrasound, and light are also possible. 129 Dong et al 145 developed a photoresponsive conducting polymer hydrogel.…”