Advances in biological barrier membranes for guided bone regeneration: Fabrication, characteristics, multifunctional optimization, and clinical prospects

Alveolar bone defects with insufficient bone mass, caused by trauma, tumors, congenital disorders, and periodontal inflammation, severely hinder natural tooth preservation and dental implantation, a key challenge in modern oral medicine. Guided bone regeneration(GBR) using barrier membranes is an essential strategy and standard clinical procedure to improve the efficiency of alveolar bone tissue repair. Both non-absorbable and absorbable membranes have good biocompatibility and can serve as barriers. However, they generally suffer from issues such as single structural design, weak mechanical properties, rapid degradation, poor antibacterial ability, and inadequate biological functions. In recent years, to overcome the various problems associated with existing commercial barrier membranes, researchers have optimized the components and controlled the structure of barrier membranes to develop multifunctional barrier membranes suitable for bone tissue regeneration. This review first outlines the common strategies for preparing GBR barrier membranes, their characteristics, and their classification. It also provides a detailed summary of the progress of research on new biomimetic barrier membranes as multifunctional platforms for repairing alveolar bone defects in biomedical engineering. Finally, it summarizes the challenges that multifunctional barrier membranes need to overcome and future development trends, laying a solid foundation for the research and clinical translation of GBR barrier membranes. • The common strategies for preparing GBR membranes were reviewed. • The characteristics and classification of GBR membranes were introduced. • The research progress multifunctional barrier membrane was summarized. • The challenges and development trends of barrier membrane were summarized.