Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
6
Hyaluronic Acid-based Scaffolds for
Brain Tissue Engineering
Xiumei M. Wang, Shenglian L. Yao and Fengyi Y. Guan
6.1 Introduction
Injuries to the adult brain caused by trauma (vehicle accidents, falls,
sports injuries and so on), tumour or disease (such as ischaemic stroke,
Parkinson's disease and Alzheimer's disease), can result in several
symptoms including cognitive, motor and psychotic dysfunction,
which affect the health and life quality of patients greatly. Therefore,
the regeneration and functional recovery of damaged brain has been
a significant issue in the field of modern medicine and neuroscience.
However, the adult brain has extremely limited regenerative capacity,
making it impossible to achieve fully spontaneous regeneration. The
development of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine provides
a new treatment strategy to repair and regenerate nervous tissues and
to re-establish neurological functions at the histological and cellular
levels [1, 2]. In particular, in the past decade, the discovery of neural
stem cells invalidates the traditional opinion that the central nervous
system (CNS) is totally unable to regenerate and brings new hope
for brain regeneration [3, 4].
By introducing scaffolds, cells and regulators to create a growth-
permissive microenvironment, brain tissue engineering has been a
promising strategy to block the inhibitory environment of axon regrowth
and thus facilitate neuroregeneration [5, 6]. In recent years, many
bioactive materials that deliver biochemical and biophysical cues to
induce certain cellular responses and activate certain gene expressions
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