Recent Trends in Drug Delivery and Emerging Biomedical Applications of Gelatin for Ophthalmic Indications

Gelatin serves as a versatile carrier system for delivering therapeutically active agents to the ocular surface owing to its inherent attributes like biocompatibility, biodegradability, targeting drug to the desired site, providing controlled release, enhancing the bioavailability of topical administration, delivering a variety of agents, and moreover, enhancing patient compliance. The present review aims to deliver the physicochemical aspects of gelatin, its conventional use, and primarily the applications of this peptide biopolymer in ophthalmic drug delivery. Micro and nano gelatin-based fabrications, namely hydrogels, nanoparticles, nanocomposites, microspheres, scaffolds, and ocular adhesives, are extensively studied and recent advances expediting these delivery systems with biomedical applications have been systematically presented in this article. All these novel approaches make gelatin as a suitable biomaterial for ocular research.