Recent advances in platelet-rich plasma and its derivatives: therapeutic agents for tissue engineering and regenerative medicine

Platelet rich plasma (PRP) is a suspension of bioactive factors and chemokine enriched plasma. Platelets are a distinctive source of membrane bound and soluble proteins that are released upon their activation. The higher count of platelets renders PRP with an array of tissue regenerative abilities. PRP can be employed in the form of platelet containing plasma, platelet lysate plasma, or in the form of a pre-gelled fibrin matrix. PRP has been an essential alternative source of growth factors in the healing and regeneration of various tissues, such as musculoskeletal, cardiovascular, and dermal tissue, with additional applications in other tissues, such as hepatic and neural. A wide range of preparative and isolation strategies have been developed for various forms of PRP at laboratory and commercial scales. Concomitantly, PRP has found its applicability as an active component in several tissue regenerative approaches, including 3D printed/bioprinted constructs, injectable hydrogels, and crosslinked scaffolds. This review focuses on the various forms of PRP and their preparation methods, the latest tissue engineering applications of PRP, and the various tissue-specific clinical trials and findings conducted using PRP. We have further discussed the optimizations required in the methods of preparation, delivery, and long-term storage of PRP. Therefore, this review seeks to benefit the scope of research on PRP-based therapeutic agents in tissue engineering by providing comprehensive insights into the widespread application. We envisage PRP could be instrumental in future patient-specific tissue engineering applications in both pre-clinical and clinical settings.