In situ forming macroporous biohybrid hydrogel for nucleus pulposus cell delivery.

Degenerative intervertebral disc disease is a common source of chronic pain and reduced quality of life in people over the age of 40. While degeneration occurs throughout the disc, it most often initiates in the nucleus pulposus (NP). Minimally invasive delivery of NP cells within hydrogels that can restore and maintain the disc height while regenerating the damaged NP tissue is a promising treatment strategy for this condition.

Adhesive Wearable Sensors for Electroencephalography from Hairy Scalp.

Electroencephalography has garnered interest for applications in mobile healthcare, human-machine interfaces, and Internet of Things. Conventional electroencephalography relies on wet and dry electrodes. Despite favorable interface impedance of wet electrodes and skin, the application of a large amount of gel at their interface with skin limits the electroencephalography spatial resolution, increases the risk of shorting between electrodes, and makes them unsuited for long-term mobile recording.

High modulus, enzyme-degradable poly(trimethylene carbonate)-peptide biohybrid networks formed from triblock prepolymers.

Biohybrid networks have the potential to have stiffnesses equivalent to that of native soft connective tissues as well as cell-mediated degradation behavior. Most strategies to generate such materials to date have utilized crosslinking of two separate and orthogonally functionalized polymers. Herein we describe a triblock prepolymer consisting of a central enzyme degradable peptide block flanked by two synthetic, hydrolysis resistant poly(trimethylene carbonate) blocks (PTMC) or poly(ethylene glycol)-PTMC blocks terminated in methacrylate groups.

One-Pot Synthesis of Unsaturated Polyester Bioelastomer with Controllable Material Curing for Microscale Designs.

Synthetic polyester elastomeric constructs have become increasingly important for a range of healthcare applications, due to tunable soft elastic properties that mimic those of human tissues. A number of these constructs require intricate mechanical design to achieve a tunable material with controllable curing. Here, the synthesis and characterization of poly(itaconate-co-citrate-co-octanediol) (PICO) is presented, which exhibits tunable formation of elastomeric networks through radical crosslinking of itaconate in the polymer backbone of viscous polyester gels.

Combinatorial and sequential delivery of gemcitabine and oseltamivir phosphate from implantable poly(d,l-lactic-co-glycolic acid) cylinders disables human pancreatic cancer cell survival.

Combination therapies against multiple targets are currently being developed to prevent resistance to a single chemotherapeutic agent and to extirpate pre-existing resistance in heterogeneous cancer cells in tumors due to selective pressure from the single agent. Gemcitabine (GEM), a chemotherapeutic agent, is the current standard of care for patients with pancreatic cancer. Patients with pancreatic cancer receiving GEM have a low progression-free survival.