Tissue repair, chitin/chitosan

A resorbable biotextile is a temporary supporting material in the human body its objective is to restore or repair the function of diseased or traumatized tissue. Several kinds of resorbable polymers are used for biotextUe applications. In suture application, glycolic and lactic add polymers are commercially used. Poly(glycolide-co-trimethylene carbonate), poly(glycolide-co-lactide-co-trimethylene carbonate), polydioxanone (Bourne, 1988), poly(lactide-co-caprolactone) (Tomihata, 1998) and polyhydroxyalkanoate (Voloka, 2003) have also been investigated for use as sutures. Natural polymers, such as chitin, chitosan and a benzyl ester of hyaluronic acid are... 

Chitin and Chitosan in Wound Healing and Tissue Repair. 7... 

Chitin and chitosan have been used as materials in wound healing and tissue engineering due to their benehcial skin repair properties. However, despite the faet that these polysaccharides appear to be efficient to a different extent in the tissue repair process, the currently marketed products exploit only the intrinsic properties of the biopolymers without further upgrading them with active functions to react at molecular level with wound pathogens. Numerous reports dealing with chitin/ chitosan functionalization at laboratory scale exist and are summarized below. 

Chitin and its deacetylated derivative chitosan are suitable bioplatforms that can be further improved by targeted functionalisation for skin repair. For example, the unique biological properties of chitosan characterised with human cell biocompatibility, human serum biodegradability, non-toxicity, antibacterial and haemostatic properties justify the use of this biopolymer in skin repair processes. The haemostatic activity of chitosan is exploited in early treatment of wounds [28], especially in large injuries subjected to heavy bleeding [29]. Many haemostatic products on the market consist thus, fully or partially, of chitosan. Moreover, chitosan aids to a rapid closure of fuU-thickness wounds due to its supportive effect to the fast growing of new blood vessels (angiogenesis) in the injured tissue [30]. Chitin and chitosan can be... 

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