Biomimetic immunomodulation strategies for effective tissue repair and restoration

Inflammation plays a central role in wound healing following injury or disease and is mediated by a precise cascade of cellular and molecular events. Unresolved inflammatory processes lead to chronic inflammation and fibrosis, which can result in prolonged wound healing lasting months or years that hampers tissue function. Therapeutic interventions mediated by immunomodulatory drugs, cells, or biomaterials, are therefore most effective during the inflammatory phase of wound healing when a pro-regenerative environment is essential. In this review, we discuss the advantages of exploiting knowledge of the native tissue microenvironment to develop therapeutics capable of modulating the immune response and promoting functional tissue repair. In particular, we provide examples of the most recent biomimetic platforms proposed to accomplish this goal, with an emphasis on those able to induce macrophage polarization towards a pro-regenerative phenotype.