Combinatorial design of biomaterials for drug delivery: opportunities and challenges.

Background: The rational design of biodegradable polymeric devices for controlled drug delivery and tissue engineering is an important area of research for advancing new therapies for cancer, diabetes and immune-related disorders. In an era of escalating costs for discovery-based research, there is an urgent need to develop new and rapid methods to design drug delivery systems.

Objective/methods: By merging this field of study with rapid and high throughput methods of design, optimization and development, researchers have been able to accelerate the discovery and design processes for these devices. Combinatorial research enables the rapid identification of key regions of interest.

Conclusion: This review focuses on the opportunities and challenges in the area of combinatorial biomaterials design for drug delivery, as there has been a great deal of significant progress over the past decade to propel this approach for the rational design of biomaterials.