Cellular therapy using temperature-responsive biodegradable injectable polymers

Abstract

Injectable polymers （IP） are polymer materials exhibiting in situ sol-to-gel transition. The authors have studied temperature-responsive biodegradable IP forming hydrogels in response to increasing temperature （around body temperature）. Moreover, the authors have developed IP formulations exhibiting arbitrarily controllable duration time of gel state and expanded medical and pharmaceutical applications of the IP formulations. On the other hand, genetically engineered cells or stem cells themselves are emerging as novel pharmaceutical modalities. Cellular therapy is expected to be a treatment technique to overcome intractable diseases. In this paper, we introduce our recent studies of IP-assisted cellular therapies （myocardial infarction therapy and cancer immunotherapy）.