Advanced Biomaterial-Based Strategies for Skeletal Muscle Tissue Engineering: From AI-Aided Design to Functional Bone–Muscle Regeneration

Dear Colleagues,

Skeletal muscle has a remarkable capacity for self-repair, yet this capacity fails after volumetric muscle loss (VML), combined bone–muscle trauma, and age-related conditions such as sarcopenia, leaving patients with permanent functional deficits and few clinical options. Biomaterial-based strategies, including bioprinted and conductive scaffolds, decellularized matrices, bioactive inorganic and ion-releasing materials, and cell-instructive hydrogels, have advanced considerably, but translation is slowed by trial-and-error material optimization, incomplete innervation and vascularization, and limited attention to the bone–muscle unit as a whole.

This Special Issue aims to bring together studies that address these gaps, with a dedicated focus on artificial intelligence (AI) as an emerging tool for biomaterial design. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to, the following:

• AI- and machine learning-aided design of biomaterials, bioinks, and scaffolds, including printability prediction, inverse design, and process optimization;
• AI-based image analysis, multi-omics integration, and digital twins for predicting regenerative outcomes;
• Biomaterials that promote innervation, vascularization, and neuromuscular junction formation;
• Strategies targeting bone–muscle crosstalk, musculoskeletal interfaces, and composite tissue injuries;
• Biomaterials for aged, sarcopenic, or diseased muscle;
• Engineered muscle and muscle-on-a-chip models for disease modeling and drug screening;
• Preclinical evaluation of functional recovery and translational considerations.

Original research articles and reviews are welcome. By linking materials innovation, data-driven design, and musculoskeletal physiology, this collection seeks to complement existing work on muscle biomaterials and help define the next generation of functional regenerative therapies.

Dr. Kamal R. Awad
Dr. Jacob Sorensen
Guest Editors

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