CHAPTER 9: Smart Biomaterials for Cardiovascular Tissue Engineering

Cardiovascular tissue engineering shows great promise for providing new and better approaches for treating various diseases of the cardiovascular system. By replacing current synthetic prosthetics with living, functional tissue, the risk of thromboembolic and calcific complications will be reduced along with the need for repeated surgeries to revise implants that eventually fail over time. The ideal construction of biomaterials for cardiovascular regeneration must follow several general principles: the materials should (1) be biocompatible and biodegradable, (2) support cell proliferation, differentiation, and integration into the host tissue while facilitating highly ordered and biomimetic neotissue, (3) possess the strength to withstand physiological mechanical stresses, and (4) be easy to manufacture and shape into patient specific forms (i.e., “off the shelf”). We possess a great understanding of the biology of tissues such as blood vessels, heart valves and the myocardium. The challenge moving forward is to select scaffold materials and geometries that are appropriate for each different aspect of the cardiovascular system and its native mechanical environment. In this chapter, we review the history of specific biomaterials, organ specific tissue engineering approaches, as well as state of the art research for generating tissue engineered blood vessels, valves, and myocardial tissues.