Nanoparticles-incorporated hydrogel microneedle for biomedical applications: Fabrication strategies, emerging trends and future prospects

Nanoparticles-incorporated hydrogel microneedles (NPs-HMN) have attracted significant attention due to their exceptional biomedical applications. The arrayed needle tips of NPs-HMN effectively penetrate the skin or tissue, enabling minimally invasive and painless delivery of therapeutic molecules into the tissue microenvironment. This approach has shown significant improvements in bioavailability and patient compliance. Moreover, the functionalized hydrogel materials of NPs-HMN exhibit a three-dimensional network structure resembling the extracellular matrix, along with controllable drug release, exceptional swelling ability, hydrophilicity, and biocompatibility. These characteristics broaden the potential applications of HMN in therapeutic and biosensing contexts. In addition, the incorporation of nanoparticles (NPs) has been shown to improve the solubility of hydrophobic drugs, enhance mechanical properties, enable intelligent drug release, and facilitate precise targeting of HMN. The versatility and diversity of treatment options afforded by NPs-HMN contribute to significant advancements in animal models and clinical settings, as well as offer valuable insights for biomaterial development. This review provides a comprehensive examination of the fabrication strategies of NPs-HMN and their recent advancements in biomedical applications. We also analyze the mechanisms, advantages, challenges, and future prospects of this system in enhancing drug delivery efficiency to provide theoretical references for further breakthroughs in novel delivery platforms.