Techniques for modifying biomaterials to improve hemocompatibility

Biomaterials have been widely explored in recent times in various compositions such as metals, polymers, ceramics, and composites; in various forms such as membranes, foams, and sheets; and in various applications, such as extra-/intracorporeal medical devices and tissue engineering. Irrespective of the composition, the form, and the application, biomaterials invariably interact with blood or blood components in the first place, and therefore it is important to have satisfactory blood-biomaterials interactions. Unfortunately, there is no universally accepted blood compatible biomaterial, but there are ways to modify them in order to achieve a desirable function. This chapter collects the state-of-the-art modification methods that have been reported in various indexing sources and summarizes them into four classes as follows: (1) physical methods—those that involve physical entities such as plasma, (2) chemical methods—(a) those that aim to introduce functional groups, (b) those that aim to load blood compatible molecules by means of physical adsorption or blending, and (c) those that aim to load blood compatible molecules by means of covalent crosslinking, (3) cellular methods—those that aim to preseed the biomaterials with endothelial cells, and lastly (4) other methods—those that do not fit into any of the above classes. The approaches presented herein are applicable to biomaterials of different compositions and forms and explored in different applications. Therefore, this chapter is up-to-date and comprehensive in its scope, and aims to act as a quick reference guide for those interested in blood-contacting biomaterials.