Nucleic Acid Aptamers for Biomaterials Development

The development of biomaterials has shifted from the development of simple, biocompatible materials to advanced biomaterials with functions to mimic biological systems. To develop these advanced materials, biomaterials are often functionalized with ligands for cell attachment or protein binding. However, many ligands lack specificity of recognizing their targets or their binding functions are difficult to control. In this chapter, nucleic acid aptamers are introduced and many of their uses in biomaterial functionalization are discussed. Nucleic acid aptamers are single-stranded oligonucleotides ligands that have many advantages over other ligands. It is expected that nucleic acid aptamers can be used to develop the next generation of biomaterials.