Delivery Strategies of Growth Factors in Cartilage Tissue Engineering

Cartilage plays an important role in supporting soft tissues, reducing joint friction, and distributing pressure. However, its self-repair capacity is limited due to the lack of blood vessels, nerves, and lymphatic systems. Tissue engineering offers a potential solution to promote cartilage regeneration by combining scaffolds, seed cells, and growth factors. Among these, growth factors play a critical role in regulating cell proliferation, differentiation, and extracellular matrix remodeling. However, their instability, susceptibility to degradation and potential side effects limit their effectiveness. This article reviews the main growth factors used in cartilage tissue engineering and their delivery strategies, including affinity-based delivery, carrier-assisted delivery, stimuli-responsive delivery, spatial structure-based delivery, and cell system-based delivery. Each method shows unique advantages in enhancing the delivery efficiency and specificity of growth factors but also faces challenges such as cost, biocompatibility, and safety. Future research needs to further optimize these strategies to achieve more efficient, safe, and economical delivery of growth factors, thereby advancing the clinical application of cartilage tissue engineering. Impact Statement Cartilage tissue engineering offers a promising solution to the limited self-repair capacity of cartilage. This review highlights the critical role of growth factors in cartilage regeneration, focusing on their effects on cell proliferation, differentiation, and extracellular matrix remodeling. It examines recent advancements in growth factor delivery strategies and discusses their potential and challenges. The review emphasizes the need to optimize these delivery systems for better efficiency, specificity, biocompatibility, and safety. Advances in this field could significantly enhance clinical applications, providing more effective and economical treatments for cartilage-related conditions and improving patient outcomes.