Abstract
Regenerative medicine in tissue engineering often relies on stem cells and specific growth factors at a supraphysiological dose. These approaches are costly and may cause severe side effects. Herein, therapeutic small extracellular vesicles (t-sEVs) endogenously loaded with a cocktail of human vascular endothelial growth factor A (VEGF-A) and human bone morphogenetic protein 2 (BMP-2) mRNAs within a customized injectable PEGylated poly (glycerol sebacate) acrylate (PEGS-A) hydrogel for bone regeneration in rats with challenging femur critical-size defects are introduced. Abundant t-sEVs are produced by a facile cellular nanoelectroporation system based on a commercially available track-etched membrane (TM-nanoEP) to deliver plasmid DNAs to human adipose-derived mesenchymal stem cells (hAdMSCs). Upregulated microRNAs associated with the therapeutic mRNAs are enriched in t-sEVs for enhanced angiogenic-osteogenic regeneration. Localized and controlled release of t-sEVs within the PEGS-A hydrogel leads to the retention of therapeutics in the defect site for highly efficient bone regeneration with minimal low accumulation in other organs.