Polymer Materials for Oral and Craniofacial Tissue Engineering

The oral and maxillofacial regions are complex areas since they are composed of different tissues. These regions can be affected by abroad range of pathologies, congenital defects, oncologic resection, trauma and infections. The current strategies involve the use of allogenic, xenogeneic and autogenic grafts. Researchers have focused on the study of new strategies based on the basic principle of tissue engineering-which means the use of cells, scaffolds and bioactive molecules to regenerate damaged tissues. The use of polymers currently represents a valid practice to design scaffolds for hard and soft tissues replacement in oral implants. In this perspective, bioinspired approaches based on the use of biopolymers (i.e., proteins, polysaccharides) naturally present in specific compartments of the biological tissues are tracing new routes for the restoration/regeneration of natural tissues located in the oral cavity-from hard (i.e., bone, dentin) to softer ones (i.e., pulp, gum).