ADVANCES AND APPLICATIONS OF HYDROGELS IN BIOMEDICAL AND PHARMACEUTICAL SCIENCE

Hydrogels have emerged as one of the most promising materials for biological applications because of their unique qualities. With properties including flexibility, adaptability, responsiveness, and a soft structure, hydrogels are networks of polymers that can absorb huge amounts of water. These characteristics outperform those of other biomaterials because they closely resemble live tissue. The source, preparation, ionic charge, responsiveness, crosslinking, and physical characteristics of hydrogels can all be used to categorize them. They have shown great promise in tissue engineering, contact lenses, wound healing, and personal hygiene products. Hydrogels are still not widely used in commercial tissue engineering and drug delivery applications, despite these benefits. Only a small number of drug-delivery devices and scaffolds have made it to market, despite the fact that many have been created, evaluated, and even patented. This review focuses on hydrogel-based biomaterials and their applications in wound healing, tissue engineering, cosmetics, drug delivery, and contact lenses. Keywords: Hydrogel, Adaptability, Drug-delivery devices, Biomaterials etc.