Department of Medical Physics, University of Wisconsin-Madison, WI, USA.
Nanoscale. 2012 Jul 7;4(13):3833-42. doi: 10.1039/c2nr31040f. Epub 2012 Jun 1.
Graphene, with its excellent physical, chemical, and mechanical properties, holds tremendous potential for a wide variety of biomedical applications. As research on graphene-based nanomaterials is still at a nascent stage due to the short time span since its initial report in 2004, a focused review on this topic is timely and necessary. In this feature review, we first summarize the results from toxicity studies of graphene and its derivatives. Although literature reports have mixed findings, we emphasize that the key question is not how toxic graphene itself is, but how to modify and functionalize it and its derivatives so that they do not exhibit acute/chronic toxicity, can be cleared from the body over time, and thereby can be best used for biomedical applications. We then discuss in detail the exploration of graphene-based nanomaterials for tissue engineering, molecular imaging, and drug/gene delivery applications. The future of graphene-based nanomaterials in biomedicine looks brighter than ever, and it is expected that they will find a wide range of biomedical applications with future research effort and interdisciplinary collaboration.
石墨烯具有优异的物理、化学和机械性能，在各种生物医学应用中具有巨大的潜力。由于自 2004 年首次报道以来时间较短，基于石墨烯的纳米材料的研究仍处于起步阶段，因此及时对这一主题进行综述是必要的。在本专题评论中，我们首先总结了石墨烯及其衍生物的毒性研究结果。尽管文献报道的结果不一致，但我们强调关键问题不是石墨烯本身有多毒，而是如何修饰和功能化它及其衍生物，使其不表现出急性/慢性毒性，能够随着时间的推移从体内清除，从而可以最好地用于生物医学应用。然后，我们详细讨论了基于石墨烯的纳米材料在组织工程、分子成像和药物/基因传递应用中的探索。基于石墨烯的纳米材料在生物医学中的未来比以往任何时候都更加光明，预计随着未来的研究努力和跨学科合作，它们将在更广泛的生物医学应用中找到一席之地。
