Marcos Lourenzoni

By Davi S. Vieira, Marcos R. Lourenzoni, Carlos A. Fuzo, Richard J. Ward and Léo Degrève

Part of the book: Innovations in Biotechnology

By Felipe Domingos de Sousa, Francisco Rogênio da Silva Mendes, Jose Jovanny Bermudez-Sierra, Ayrles Fernanda Brandão da Silva, Mirele da Silveira Vasconcelos, Tamiris de Fátima Goebel de Souza, Marília de Oliveira Nunes, Antônio Eufrásio Vieira-Neto, Marcos Roberto Lourenzoni, Rosueti Diógenes de Oliveira-Filho, Adriana Rolim Campos, Renato de Azevedo Moreira and Ana Cristina de Oliveira Monteiro-Moreira

Natural biomolecules are increasingly relevant for biomedical applications and tissue engineering for being able to produce an effect on chemical signals, organization of cells, and restitution of extracellular matrix in lesioned tissues. In this chapter, we will address the potential of plant macromolecules, in particular, carbohydrates and proteins such as hemicelluloses and lectins. While lectins are mostly carbohydrate-binding proteins, which can interact with cell surfaces to initiate anti-inflammatory pathways, as well as immunomodulatory functions, hemicelluloses are remarkably known by their ability to form viscous solutions even at low concentrations, which makes them an excellent candidate as vehicle to carry different sorts of biomolecules. Taking into account the complexity of the whole healing process, as an overlapping and coordinated cascade of events, most of the properties presented here by those materials may be of interest to the wound-care market.

Part of the book: Wound Healing