Abstract
Bone defects pose a heavy burden on healthcare, with millions requiring reconstructive surgery annually. While biomaterials can aid bone regeneration, they are therapeutically still less effective than auto- and allografts. The efficacy of biomaterials can be boosted with osteogenic growth factors, yet the high doses that are required often cause severe side effects. Messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) offers a promising alternative by achieving endogenous growth factor production. Extensive research has been dedicated to improve the efficacy of systemic delivery of mRNA by reducing mRNA immunogenicity and enhancing mRNA stability and transfection efficacy, but research on development of biomaterial scaffolds to facilitate local mRNA delivery is still scarce.The overall objective of this doctoral thesis, in the context of which this data set was created, was to develop a suitable nanoparticle-based biomaterial for the delivery of mRNA to ultimately serve as a functionalized bone substitute with enhanced biological activity to stimulate bone regeneration. To this end, hydrogels based on organic gelatin and inorganic hydroxyapatite nanospheres were designed. These two nanoparticles were selected as building blocks due to their similarity with the natural bone matrix. Towards the overall objective, we individually investigated gelatin nanoparticles and hydroxyapatite regarding their mRNA delivery capacity and cytocompatibility, respectively. Moreover, we evaluated the sterilization of gelatin nanoparticles using supercritical carbon dioxide, as an alternative to steam sterilization for thermosensitive biomaterials. Lastly, we combined these two types of nanoparticles as nanoparticle-based nanocomposites and assessed their cytocompatibility as well as their ability to deliver mRNA to cells.The data resulting from these investigations can be found in this data collection.
