ABSTRACT
In this chapter, TE applications, advancements and future directions within the scope of OMFS are reviewed. Despite tremendous progression of innovative surgical techniques in oral and maxillofacial surgery (OMFS), repair of degenerated or surgically removed tissue remains a challenge, with considerable socio-economic impact. Tissue engineering (TE) can be defined as the creation of new functional tissue using a scaffold or template engineered to direct desirable cellular behaviour. The scaffold has a number of purposes: TE offers considerable advantages over implants used in OMFS. Synthetic biodegradable polymeric materials polyglycolic acid, polyethylene glycol have gained attention due to their tailorable mechanical and degradable properties, but alone, fail to provide adequate cell-binding motifs or cues to encourage bone regeneration. Furthermore, several labs are investigating bio-printing where hydrogels and cells are printed together, which offer the advantage of creating scaffold for particular sized defects.
