Engineering Hydrogel for Biomedical Applications (2nd Edition)

Dear Colleagues,

We are grateful to all authors, reviewers, and readers for their responses to the first Edition of our Special Issue on “Engineering Hydrogel for Biomedical Applications”. You can access these articles for free via the link:

https://www.mdpi.com/journal/gels/special_issues/Engineering_Hydrogel

The Special Issue on “Engineering Hydrogel for Biomedical Applications” is dedicated to the recent development of hydrogel chemistries and properties for biomedical applications including tissue engineering, drug delivery, and cell encapsulation. More than that, the advanced techniques used for hydrogel preparation will be also encouraged for discussion, such as 3D bioprinting and electrospinning to prepare structured hydrogels or techniques to fabricate microgels for drug/cell encapsulation.

Hydrogels have been widely applied in the biomedical fields given their excellent relevant physiochemical and biological properties such as hydrophilicity, biomimetic mechanics, low protein absorption, and non-toxicity. Various biomaterials containing natural and synthetic materials have been used to prepare multiple hydrogels through different crosslinking mechanisms. The practical use of hydrogels in biomedical applications requires developments in hydrogel compositions (e.g., chemistry, crosslinking, mechanics, biological cues, degradability, etc.) and hydrogel structure (e.g., porous network, nanofibrous structure, alignment, etc.). Recently, the translation of hydrogels from lab to clinic has attracted significant attention, which has accelerated the development of the biofabrication of hydrogels. Techniques such as electrospinning and 3D bioprinting have been developed to fabricate scaffolds for in vivo tissue engineering and wound healing, which shows a great potential for clinical use and commercialization.

Given that it is too challenging to include all aspects of hydrogels in one issue, this Special Issue will focus on the engineering of hydrogel chemistries and structures for biomedical applications. We look forward to the submission of new results in hydrogel research. The submission of studies relating to hydrogels for tissue engineering, cell encapsulation, drug delivery, and wound healing is appreciated.

Prof. Dr. Junfeng Shi
Dr. Fei Xu
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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• hydrogel synthesis
• hydrogel structure
• biofabrication
• tissue engineering
• drug delivery
• cell encapsulation
• wound healing