Chitosan Nanofibers in Regenerative Medicine

Abstract

Chitosan, a natural biopolymer, has been widely explored in the field of biomedical engineering. Because of its chemical similarity to the extracellular matrix (ECM) components, chitosan is known to be extremely biocompatible. It has been fabricated into various scaffold forms such as membranes, hydrogels, films, beads, particles, etc. for a large number of regenerative applications. Chitosan nanofibrous membranes are quite popular in the field of tissue regeneration because of their structural and chemical similarity to the natural ECM. The nanostructure very closely mimics the ECM and also provides increased surface to deliver biotherapeutics. This chapter attempts to summarize and highlight some of the recent research efforts that have been carried out to explore the tissue engineering, drug delivery, and wound healing applications of chitosan nanofibrous membranes. It also discusses some of the human trials where chitosan membranes have been effectively used to treat certain conditions, and also mentions issues which need to be addressed before chitosan nanofibrous membranes can be translated to the clinics for human use.