At physiological pH, sodium hyaluronate is the main form of hyaluronic acid. The term “hyaluronan” is used to refer to the polysaccharide in general, and in literature, “hyaluronic acid” and “sodium hyaluronate” are often used interchangeably.
Hyaluronan is therapeutically used to treat knee osteoarthritis and is effective in alleviating arthritic pain. Crosslinked hyaluronan gels are utilized as drug delivery systems.
Hyaluronan is the most prevalent negatively charged glycosaminoglycan in the human vitreous humor and is known to interact with polymeric and liposomal DNA complexes. Hyaluronan solutions have been shown to reduce the cellular uptake of these complexes, which is beneficial for increasing the availability and retention time of drugs administered to the eye. Being immunoneutral, hyaluronan is valuable for attaching biomaterials used in tissue engineering and drug delivery systems. It also has significant applications in vascular surgery and vascular supplementation.