8 - Electrospinning and microfluidics: An integrated approach for tissue engineering and cancer

Abstract

Progress in microfluidic technology has enabled precise manipulation of small volumes of fluids, leading to the development of low-cost and portable systems that have shown considerable promise in biomedicine. Although these functional devices have gained a great deal of attention over the past decades, a new fascinating trend concerns the integration of microfluidics with other fabrication techniques, with particular regard to electrospinning and additive manufacturing.In this chapter, the attention will be focused on integrative approaches obtained combining microfluidics and electrospinning, highlighting the recent advances and challenges in the tissue-engineering framework. Indeed, although this innovative trend is still at its beginning, significant results have been achieved both in the microfluidic-aided fabrication of novel microstructured materials and in the development of new biosensors and analytical devices for point-of-care diagnostics.