BIODEGRADABLE POLYMERS FOR DENTAL TISSUE ENGINEERING AND REGENERATION

Over the last decade, biodegradable polymers have replaced traditional non-degradable polymers in widespread applications in biomedical areas used for sutures, implantable materials, drug delivery systems, substrates for tissue engineering, and so forth. Compared to other implant materials, such as metals, biodegradable polymers degrade in vivo, by either enzymatic, microbial, or chemical process producing non-toxic byproducts. Based on their origin, biodegradable polymers can be common classified as natural and synthetic materials. Natural biodegradable polymers are obtained from living organisms (i.e., bacteria) as intra- or extra- cellular products. Natural-based materials include polysaccharides (starch, alginate, chitosan, and hyaluronic acid derivatives) or proteins (soy, collagen, fibrin, gels, and silk) and polynucleotides (DNA, RNA). Synthetic biodegradable polymers are often synthetized by condensation reactions, ring opening polymerization, or metal catalysts and offer greater advantages than natural materials due to a wider range of properties and more predictable lot-to-lot uniformity. Synthetic biodegradable polymer includes poly(lactic acid) (PLA), poly(glycolic acid) (PGA), poly(lactic-co-glycolide) (PLGA) copolymers, and polycaprolactone (PCL). Nowadays, biodegradable materials play an important role in dental or maxillofacial surgery above all for bone regeneration and periodontal disease even if they were originally developed for other applications.