The use of scaffolds in dental regenerative medicine

Scaffolds are defined as three-dimension porous solid biomaterials designed to perform some or all of the following functions:
-promote cell-biomaterial interactions, cell adhesion, and extracellular matrix (ECM) deposition
-permit sufficient transport of gases, nutrients, and regulatory factors to allow cell survival, proliferation, and differentiation
-biodegrade at a controllable rate that approximates the rate of tissue regeneration under the culture conditions of interest, and
-provoke a minimal degree of inflammation or toxicity in vivo. 
Scaffolds can be used as replacements for diseased or damaged tissues.
Their role is to provide support for delivering cells and/or growth factors to the proposed site of tissue regeneration.
THE AIM of this review was to describe the current types of scaffolds and evaluate their use in combination with stem cells for tissue engineering applications