Conditions, accidents, and aging processes have brought
with them
the need to develop implants with higher technology that allow not
only the replacement of missing tissue but also the formation of tissue
and the recovery of its function. The development of implants is
due to advances in different areas such as molecular-biochemistry
(which allows the understanding of the molecular/cellular processes
during tissue repair), materials engineering, tissue regeneration
(which has contributed advances in the knowledge of the properties
of the materials used for their manufacture), and the so-called intelligent
biomaterials (which promote tissue regeneration through inductive
effects of cell signaling in response to stimuli from the microenvironment
to generate adhesion, migration, and cell differentiation processes).
The implants currently used are combinations of biopolymers with properties
that allow the formation of scaffolds with the capacity to mimic the
characteristics of the tissue to be repaired. This review describes
the advances of intelligent biomaterials in implants applied in different
dental and orthopedic problems; by means of these advances, it is
expected to overcome limitations such as additional surgeries, rejections
and infections in implants, implant duration, pain mitigation, and
mainly, tissue regeneration.