A perspective on light-based bioprinting of DNA hydrogels for advanced bone regeneration: Implication for bone organoids

Light-based three-dimensional (3D) printing of hydrogels has been widely adopted for accelerating bone regeneration. However, the design principles of traditional hydrogels do not take into consideration the biomimetic regulation of multiple stages throughout the bone healing, and the hydrogels made cannot effectively induce sufficient osteogenesis, which in turn greatly limits their capacity in guiding bone regeneration. The recent progress achieved in DNA hydrogel, which is based on synthetic biology, could facilitate the innovation of the current strategy due to its advantages, such as resistance to enzymatic degradation, programmability, structural controllability, and mechanical properties. However, 3D printing of DNA hydrogel is not well defined and appears to have a few distinct early forms. In this article, a perspective on the early development of 3D printing of DNA hydrogels is presented, and a potential implication of the hydrogel-based bone organoids built-up for bone regeneration is proposed.

Automated summary

The design principles of traditional hydrogels hinder their effectiveness in guiding bone regeneration, as they do not consider the biomimetic regulation of multiple stages in bone healing. DNA hydrogels, based on synthetic biology, have the potential to overcome these limitations due to their resistance to enzymatic degradation, programmability, structural controllability, and mechanical properties. However, the 3D printing of DNA hydrogels is not well-defined and is still in its early stages.