Polymeric Electrospinning for Musculoskeletal Regenerative Engineering

Abstract

Musculoskeletal tissue loss or damage resulting from trauma, surgery, or disease presents a significant medical challenge. Current therapies involving grafts are hindered by concerns over donor site morbidity and limited functional improvement. Regenerative engineering emerges as a promising transdisciplinary strategy for tissue repair and regeneration based on the convergence of tissue engineering, advanced materials science, stem cell science, and developmental biology. Of particular interest is the development of cell-instructive matrices that closely mimic the properties of the native tissues. Electrospinning provides a versatile technology platform for the design and fabrication of nanofiber-based scaffolds that are similar to natural extracellular matrix. Biodegradable polymers constitute an attractive class of biomaterials for the development of electrospun structures due to flexibility in chemistry and the ability to be excreted or resorbed by the body. Here, we highlight the importance of material cues on cellular responses and discuss recent advances in the development of electrospun polymeric structures as biomimetic matrices to regenerate musculoskeletal tissues with a focus on the work involving bone, tendon, skeletal muscle, and their interfaces. Scaffold-based regenerative engineering represents a clinical translational strategy for tissue regeneration. A scaffold offers an engineered cell microenvironment to direct cell migration, growth, differentiation, and organization to form regenerated tissue. Successful tissue regeneration critically depends on the development of scaffolds that mimic the hierarchical architecture of native tissue extracellular matrix. In particular, electrospun polymer nanofibers provide an enabling technology platform to engineer a scaffold system with an appropriate combination of physical, chemical, and biological properties for regeneration of various musculoskeletal tissues.