Overview of Tissue Engineering and Drug Delivery Applications of Reactive Electrospinning and Crosslinking Techniques of Polymeric Nanofibers with Highlights on Their Biocompatibility Testing and Regulatory Aspects

Abstract

Traditional electrospinning is a promising technique for fabricating nanofibers for tissue engineering and drug delivery applications. The method is highly efficient in producing nanofibers with morphology and porosity similar to the extracellular matrix. Nonetheless, and in many instances, the process has faced several limitations, including weak mechanical strength, large diameter distributions, and scaling-up difficulties of its fabricated electrospun nanofibers. The constraints of the polymer solution’s intrinsic properties are primarily responsible for these limitations. Reactive electrospinning constitutes a novel and modified electrospinning techniques developed to overcome those challenges and improve the properties of the fabricated fibers intended for various biomedical applications. This review mainly addresses reactive electrospinning techniques, a relatively new approach for making in situ or post-crosslinked nanofibers. It provides an overview of and discusses the recent literature about chemical and photoreactive electrospinning, their various techniques, their biomedical applications, and FDA regulatory aspects related to their approval and marketing. Another aspect highlighted in this review is the use of crosslinking and reactive electrospinning techniques to enhance the fabricated nanofibers’ physicochemical and mechanical properties and make them more biocompatible and tailored for advanced intelligent drug delivery and tissue engineering applications.

Improved Recovery of Complete Spinal Cord Transection by a Plasma-Modified Fibrillar Scaffold

“…Due to its versatile processability, PLA has been used in many applications [ 25 , 41 , 42 ], such as devices fabricated using different techniques, such as 3D printing or electrospinning [ 40 ]. In particular, electrospinning produces scaffolds that can mimic the extracellular matrix, both its architectural and mechanical properties, by adequately configuring the process parameters [ 26 , 43 , 44 , 45 ]. Finetuning the scaffolds’ properties such as porosity, the surface-to-volume ratio, topography, bioactivity, and mechanical compliance constitutes a continuously updated research field [ 45 ].…”

“…In particular, electrospinning produces scaffolds that can mimic the extracellular matrix, both its architectural and mechanical properties, by adequately configuring the process parameters [ 26 , 43 , 44 , 45 ]. Finetuning the scaffolds’ properties such as porosity, the surface-to-volume ratio, topography, bioactivity, and mechanical compliance constitutes a continuously updated research field [ 45 ]. Nevertheless, due to the limited hydrophilicity of PLA, surface modification is usually applied in tissue engineering applications [ 25 , 44 , 46 ].…”