Cancer is the second leading cause of death in the United States, claiming more than 560,000 lives each year. Osteosarcoma (OS) is the most common primary malignant tumor of bone in children and young adults, while bone is a common site of metastasis for tumors initiating from other tissues. The heterogeneity, continual evolution, and complexity of this disease at different stages of tumor progression drives a critical need for physiologically relevant models that capture the dynamic cancer microenvironment and advance chemotherapy techniques. Monolayer cultures have been favored for cell-based research for decades due to their simplicity and scalability. However, the nature of these models makes it impossible to fully describe the biomechanical and biochemical cues present in 3-dimensional (3D) microenvironments, such as ECM stiffness, degradability, surface topography, and adhesivity. Biomaterials have emerged as valuable tools to model the behavior of various cancers by creating highly tunable 3D systems for studying neoplasm behavior, screening chemotherapeutic drugs, and developing novel treatment delivery techniques. This review highlights the recent application of biomaterials toward the development of tumor models, details methods for their tunability, and discusses the clinical and therapeutic applications of these systems.

癌症是美国第二大死因，每年夺走超过 56 万人的生命。骨肉瘤（OS）是儿童和青少年最常见的原发性骨恶性肿瘤，而骨是其他组织起始肿瘤的常见转移部位。这种疾病在肿瘤进展的不同阶段的异质性、持续进化和复杂性推动了对捕获动态癌症微环境和先进化疗技术的生理相关模型的迫切需求。几十年来，单层培养物因其简单性和可扩展性而一直受到基于细胞的研究的青睐。然而，这些模型的性质使其不可能完全描述 3 维 (3D) 微环境中存在的生物力学和生化线索，例如 ECM 刚度、可降解性、表面形貌和粘附性。通过创建高度可调的 3D 系统来研究肿瘤行为、筛选化疗药物和开发新型治疗技术，生物材料已成为模拟各种癌症行为的宝贵工具。这篇综述重点介绍了生物材料最近在肿瘤模型开发中的应用，详细介绍了其可调节性的方法，并讨论了这些系统的临床和治疗应用。