Production of NorHA Microspheres for Peptide Tethering

Tissue engineering is an essential part of regenerative medicine. For bone regeneration, scaffolds are used as ways for inducing stem cell proliferation/differentiation, and drug delivery. Current scaffolds are bulky and inefficient. To produce a scaffold that has improved mechanical properties and is less invasive, the scaffold used for this experiment is a hydrogel formed from microspheres composed of hyaluronic acid functionalized with norbornene groups (NorHA). Peptides and other biomolecules are patterned onto the surface of these microspheres through ultraviolet photoconjugation, allowing for stem cell attachment, differentiation, and signaling, all essential for tissue regeneration.