Injectable Hydrogel-Based Nanocomposites for Cardiovascular Diseases

Abstract

Cardiovascular diseases (CVDs), including a series of pathological disorders, severely affect millions of people all over the world. To address this issue, several potential therapies have been developed for treating CVDs, including injectable hydrogels as a minimally invasive method. However, the utilization of injectable hydrogel is a bit restricted recently owing to some limitations, such as transporting the therapeutic agent more accurately to the target site and prolonging their retention locally. This review focuses on the advances in injectable hydrogels for CVD, detailing the types of injectable hydrogels (natural or synthetic), especially that complexed with stem cells, cytokines, nano-chemical particles, exosomes, genetic material including DNA or RNA, etc. Moreover, we summarized the mainly prominent mechanism, based on which injectable hydrogel present excellent treating effect of cardiovascular repair. All in all, it is hopefully that injectable hydrogel-based nanocomposites would be a potential candidate through cardiac repair in CVDs treatment.

Keywords: angiogenesis; cardiovascular diseases; injectable hydrogel; nanocomposite; stem cell homing.

FIGURE 1

Common types of natural injectable hydrogels materials.

FIGURE 2

Commonly used chemical structure of synthetic materials. 4-Aminodiphenylamine; PAA (Poly acrylic acid); 4-amino-TEMPO; CHA (cyclohexylamine); VP (N-vinylpyrrolidone); NIPAM (N-Isopropyl acrylamide); PEG (poly ethylene glycol); MAA (Meth acrylic acid); MANHS (methacrylic acid N-hydroxysuccinimide ester); nPEG-MA [Poly ethylene glycol (n) monomethacrylate]; Eosin γ [Eosin γ bis(tetrabutylammonium salt) + 2-(2,4,5,7-tetrabromo-3-oxido-6-oxoxanthen-9 yl)benzoate,tetrabutylazanium].

FIGURE 3

Common types of active nanomaterials complexed in injectable hydrogels for tissue repair.

FIGURE 4

Comparison about the method of cardiovascular regeneration of hydrogel. (A) Cells Delivery produces paracrine effects, while hydrogels reduce the reduction of myocardial wall thickness, preserve heart function, prevent the formation of fibrous tissue, and provide a suitable environment for cell survival. Injectable hydrogels loaded cells suppress the reduction of wall thickness by Inhibiting physical tension to provide a suitable environment, and significantly improve the efficacy of cell therapy. (B) Commonly used cell types: CMs, cardiomyocytes; EPC, endothelial progenitor cells; brown adipose derived stem cells; embryonic stem cells; MSCs, mesenchymal stem cells.

FIGURE 5

Schematic illustrations of different growth factors signaling during angiogenesis.

FIGURE 6

Mechanisms of MSC transendothelial migration toward injured tissue.