Fig. 5.

Application of biomaterials in stem cell therapy. By altering the tunable matrix properties of 3D cell culture, the cellular behaviors, including proliferation, differentiation, migration, attachment, and adhesion, can be controlled. The 3D culture with tunable properties can be spatiotemporally controlled to mimic the native ECM for the further guidance of stem cell behaviors to form desired organoids or organ-on-a-chip (OOC). Organoids and OOC have a wide range of applications, such as disease modeling, drug screening, etc. These properties of 3D culture can also be incorporated into designing the injectable hydrogels and stem cell patches for the delivery of stem cells. These cell delivery vehicles possess outstanding advantages, such as low invasiveness, high efficiency, decreased cell death, etc. ECM, extracellular matrix; and RPE, retinal pigment epithelium.