Table 2.

Example of studies, which have demonstrated that the use of different chemical inductors can direct stem cell differentiation

Immobilised chemical inductor	Scaffold type	Functional group	Differentiation outcome	Ref
Chemical group
	Silk fibroin	-COO-	hMSC osteogenic differentiation	Murphy et al[59]
	Silk fibroin	=C=O	hMSC osteogenic differentiation	Murphy et al[59]
	Silk fibroin	SO3H	hMSC osteogenic differentiation	Murphy et al[59]
	PEG	PO3	Increase in hMSC osteogenic markers at gene and protein level	Benoit et al[60], Nuttelman et al[61], Nuttelman et al[62], Gandavarapu et al[63]
	Silk fibroin	NH2	hMSC osteogenic differentiation	Murphy et al[59]
	Silk fibroin	CH3	hMSC osteogenic differentiation	Murphy et al[59]
	Glass	COOH, CH3, OH, NH2	-NH2 support hMSC osteogenic differentiation	Liu et al[64]
	Glass	OH, SO3H, NH2, COOH, SH and CH3	-NH2 support hNSC differentiation	Ren et al[65]
	Glass	CH3, NH2, SH, OH and COOH	NH2 and -SH- promoted and maintained hMSC Osteogenesis, -OH and -COOH- promoted and maintained chondrogenesis	Curran et al[66]
Peptide sequence
	Alginate	Osteopontin peptide	Increase in hMSC osteogenic markers	Lee et al[67]
	HA-PLG	Osteocalcin peptide	Increase hMSC osteogenic markers	Lee et al[68]
	PLGA	BMP-2 peptide	Increase rMSC ALP expression in osteogenic medium and promotion of ectopic bone formation in vivo	Lin et al[15]
	RGD	BCP/PLA	hMSC osteogenic differentiation	Shin et al[70]
Molecule
	PLGA	BMP-2	hMSC osteogenic differentiation	Ko et al[71]
	PLLA	BMP-2	hMSC osteogenic differentiation	Beazley et al[16]
	Collagen-PLGA hybrid	Collagen-binding domain derived from fibronectin (CBD-BMP4)	hMSC osteogenic differentiation	Lu et al[72]
	Methacrylamide chitosan hydrogel coated glass substrates	Laminin and collagen	Supported hNSC differentiation	Wilkinson et al[73]
	PMMA-g-PEG	EGF	MSC osteogenic differentiation	Platt et al[74]
	Agarose	PDGF-AA	MSC neural differentiation	Aizawa et al[75]
	PCL/PCL-PEG	NGF	MSC neural differentiation	Cho et al[76]
	Chitosan/collagen IV	VEGF	Endothelial differentiation	Chiang et al[77], Poh et al[78], Rahman et al[79]

hESC: Human embryonic stem cell; hMSC: Human mesenchymal stem cell; rMSCs: Rat mesenchymal stem cell; hNSC: Human neural stem cell; PEG: Polyethylene glycol; HA-PLG: Hydroxyapatite (HA)/poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid); BMP: Bone morphogenetic protein; PLGA: Poly(lactic- co –g lycolic acid); PLA: Poly(lactic acid); PLLA: Poly(L-lactide); PCL: Polycaprolactone; PMMA-g-PEG: Poly(methyl methacrylate)-graft-poly(ethylene glycol; BCP: Biphasic calcium phosphate; EGF: Epidermal growth factor; NGF: Nerve growth factor; PDGF-AA: Platelet-derived Growth Factor AA; VEGF: Vascular endothelial growth factor.