The article “Solvent free approaches for the processing of scaffolds in regenerative medicine” by Víctor Santos-Rosales, Ana Iglesias-Mejuto and Carlos A. García-González has been published in Polymers Journal and also selected as cover of the Issue 3, Volume 12, March 2020.
A new way to tackle bone pathologies. This review discusses the main advantages and drawbacks of current solvent-free methods for the production of synthetic scaffolds and also collects representative examples of the use of these techniques in regenerative medicine. This biomedical field is always looking for alternatives for the production of scaffolds able to promote the regeneration of a functional tissue, offering the possibility of revising the current options for the treatment of bone pathologies. These diseases cause high disability in patients and represent a high socio-sanitary cost in the majority of the developing countries because of the population aging and the new social habits. The gold-standard to these pathologies are biological grafts or synthetic implants but their limitations highlight the need of new implant development strategies. Particularly, synthetic polymeric scaffolds obtained by a solvent-free approach and able to promote long-term and fully functional tissue regeneration assisted by bioactive agents loaded in their structure are of special relevance.
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