Advances in the application of bone morphogenetic proteins and their derived peptides in bone defect repair

BMPs are members of the transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β) superfamily and have been extensively studied due to their excellent osteoinductive ability and multiple functions. Currently, research on the application of BMPs is primarily focused on the delivery system of BMPs to achieve local administration of BMPs and delay the decay of BMPs due to the short half-life of BMPs and their easy degradation in vivo. Meanwhile, to enhance the effect of BMPs, researchers have combined BMPs with other growth factors (GFs) during osteoinduction. The key issues encountered in these studies are the mechanisms of osteoinduction when BMPs are combined with delivery systems or GFs, and how to successfully translate the findings of basic research into clinical treatments for bone defect repair. In this paper, we review the progress of BMP research, including the structure and function of BMPs and BMP-related derived peptides, as well as the binding of BMPs to various loading materials, cells, and GFs. Finally, we summarize the applications of BMPs in bone defect repair and related disease treatment, and propose some improvements of BMPs which provide new ideas for better application of BMPs in clinical tissue defect repair.