Production and performance of biomaterials containing RGD peptides

The arginine-glycine-aspartic acid (RGD) sequence binds to key cell membrane structures within the integrin family. These sequences are found on several extracellular proteins that have roles in cell adhesion. Therefore, it is not surprising that with the advent of the field of tissue engineering a large amount of work has been carried out on materials functionalised with a wide variety of RGD-containing peptides. In this review we provide an overview of the field to 2007 and we include both synthesis and design strategies required to produce useful RGD functional materials.