Neural repair and regeneration for tissue engineering is the most promising strategy for treating human brain neurological diseases. Main bottle neck of the clinical therapy is that no ideal scaffold biomaterials as vehicle of neural stem cells (NSCs) and growth factors have been developed yet, even for the clinical tests. To solve this problem, a lot of work has been done and numerous kinds of biomaterials have been studied. The interaction between NSCs and biomaterials, especially the regulation of NSCs by materials, plays an essential role during the scaffold biomaterial selection. The article gives an overview on the recent progresses on regulation of NSCs by biomaterial and shows some recent patents regarding the progress in the field.

Tissue engineering, neural repair, scaffold biomaterial, signal pathway, neural stem cells (NSCs), central nervous systems, cerebral ischemia, spinal cord injury (SCI), traumatic brain injury, neurodegenerative disorders, Alzheimer's disease, biocompatible, immunologically inert, conducting, biodegradable, infection-resistant, synthetic biomaterials, Natural biomaterials, inflammation-resistance, nylon, silica gel, polyurethane, biodegradable poly-hydroxyacetic acid, poly-lactic acid, Poly (DLlactide-co-glycolide acid, bioactive factors, Chitosan, poly (beta-(1, 4)-2-amino-2-deoxy-D-glucose, poly (beta-(1, 4)-D-glucosamine, neurotrophin-3 (NT-3), oligodendrocytes, Chitosan films (Chi-F), chitosan porous scaffolds (Chi-PS), chitosan multimicrotubule conduits (Chi-MC), methacrylamide chitosan (MAC), Young's elastic modulus (E-Y), Gelatin, Collagen Scaffolds, basic fibroblast growth factor (bFGF), synapses, Seeding human embryonic stem cell-derived NPC (hESC-NPC), CNTF (ciliary neurotrophic factor)-collagen gel-controlled delivery system, Extracellular Matrix (ECM), fibronectin, laminin, 3-D matrix adhesion, growth factor-reduced Matrigel (gfrMG), tyrosine hydroxylase (TH), dopaminergic neurons, Hyaluronic Acid (HA) Hydrogel, photoencapsulated, Self-assembling peptide, Self-assembling peptide nanofiber scaffold (SAPNS), glial cell adhesion, cytokines, regenerative medicine, mood disorders, manic depressive disorders, polyurethane (PU), polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHA) matrix, poly (ethylene) glycol (PEG), electrospinning, cell adhesion, proliferation, embryonic stem cell, chondrogenic cell, nanolithography technique, fibrin, ethyl-3-(3-dimethyl aminopropyl) carbodiimide (EDC) and, N-hydroxysuccinimide (NHS), biomimetic matrix, demyelinating disease, comprising leukemia inhibitory factor, Huntington disease, sonic hedgehog-GLI, (SHH-GLI) pathway, valproic acid (VPA), azacytidine (5AzaC), gene expressions, nanofabrication

Institute of Regenerative Medical and Biomimetic Materials, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, P.R. China.