The surface properties of materials are very critical for their use in
biomedical applications, such as biomedical implants, tissue engineering scaffolds, and
other biomedical devices, including drug delivery devices. The different bioapplications
are very specific in their requirement for the surface properties of
materials. Polysaccharides have been extensively studied for their biomedical
applications, e.g., tissue engineering scaffolds, drug delivery devices and wound
healing. Various classes of polysaccharides have been employed for different bioapplications
due to their structural variability, which provides the desired surface
properties for specific biomedical applications. However, to improve the material
properties further at the cell-material interface for various bio-applications,
polysaccharides have attracted renewed interest amongst researchers due to certain
advantages, such as the material of choice over other available biomaterials metallic,
ceramic and polymeric either in combinations or alone. This chapter covers the
advances in the use of different classes of polysaccharides in terms of their origin and
their modified forms for various applications. The further discussion involves the
various surface characteristics required at cell-material interfaces for biomaterials for
application in tissue scaffolds. Furthermore, the discussion involves the various
bioapplications of polysaccharides, focusing on applications in tissue engineering and
drug delivery.
Keywords: Biomaterials, Drug Delivery, Polysaccharide, Porosity, Scaffold,
Stiffness, Surface Charge, Surface Modification, Tissue Engineering, Wound
Healing, Wettability.
