ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Gelatin methacryloyl has been widely used in the field of tissue engineering, as it has suitable biological properties, tunable physical and chemical properties, non-cytotoxic and non-immunogenicity.OBJECTIVE: To summarize the latest advances in the repair of skin and soft tissue damage using gelatin methacryl hydrogel materials. METHODS: PubMed and SciFinder were retrieved for articles concerning gelatin methacrylate hydrogels published from January 2007 to August 2017. The key words were "seed cell, skin regeneration, wound vascularization, gelatin, gelatin methacryloyl, scaffold material, wound healing, microenvironment, tissue construction, skin tissue engineering". RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: The gelatin methacryloyl hydrogel is very similar to the native extracellular matrix, and has a cell adhesion site, a matrix metalloproteinase-reactive peptide-based sequence and a cross-linkable property exhibiting good tissue affinity. The hydrogel has adjustable physical and chemical properties, a certain degree of adhesion and biodegradability, which make it an ideal cell scaffold, allowing all kinds of cells to proliferate and extend on its surface. Therefore, gelatin methacrylamide hydrogel has broad prospects in the skin tissue engineering, which can accelerate wound vascularization and epithelial tissue regeneration, improve wound healing rate, reduce the probability of infection, and improve the patient's quality life. The gelatin methacrylamide hydrogen is proved to provide an efficient and portable gel dressing for burn wounds and war wounds, and it can also be used to fill skin and soft tissue defects such as trauma and ulcers, and cover cosmetic incisions.