Electrophoretic deposition of biological macromolecules, drugs, and cells

The use of biological entities in biotechnology and the biomedical field is of great interest as the biocompatibility and the functionality of naturally occurring is usually higher compared to other biomaterials, for example, synthetic polymers. Processing of natural biomolecules, including proteins like collagen and also living cells and bacteria, to develop medical devices, bioactive coatings, functionalized implants, tissue scaffolds, or biosensors, is however challenging. Electrophoretic deposition, a technique that takes advantage of the presence of charged particles or molecules in suitable solvents, is a low-temperature process suitable for manipulating a wide range of biomolecules and biological entities preserving their bioactivity, which could be otherwise lost by processing at high temperatures. Another advantage of EPD is the possibility to use aqueous suspensions to process biological entities given that organic solvents also could lead to degradation of biomolecules. This paper gives an overview of the available literature on the application of EPD to process different biomolecules and biological entities, like proteins, bacteria cells, hyaluronic acid, and therapeutic drugs, aiming at using such biomaterials in numerous applications ranging from biosensors to orthopedic implants, tissue scaffolds, and drug delivery devices.