Procedures to re-open occluded blood vessels, such as angioplasty, often lead to injury of the arterial wall and subsequent renarrowing of the artery, or restenosis. Restenosis results, at least in part, from the migration and proliferation of smooth muscle cells and their secretion of matrix proteins to form an occlusive neointimal layer within the vessel.~1 NO has been shown to reduce smooth muscle cell proliferation and platelet adhesion while increasing endothelial cell proliferation and should thus aid in the prevention of restenosis.~2 The hydrogel materials that we have developed can be used to form thin coatings (10 mum) on the luminal surface of an artery via interfacial photopolymerization to provide local and sustained NO therapy following vascular injury. In this study, we have investigated the release kinetics of three different NO-producing hydrogels and their effects on smooth muscle cell proliferation and platelet adhesion.
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