Abstract: 
Hydrogels made from hydrophilic and three dimensional crosslinked polymers are discovered by Wichterle and Lim, since then they have been offered indispensible applications to the biomedical field including pharmaceutical sciences. As these systems have similarity with biological tissues more than any other class of synthetic materials and due to this hydrogels succeeded in attracting the attention of pharmaceutical scientists to explore their use in development of drug delivery systems for various bioactive molecules. The soft consistency, high water content and low interfacial tension with biological fluids of the hydrogel materials made them biocompatible. The unique property of the different sized molecules has an ability to diffuse in and out of hydrogels permitted their use as a carrier for drug delivery system. Further research on these systems resulted into invention of variety of hydrogel forms which are having versatile applications. There is an ampoule scope for preparing these systems as physiological stimuli materials so as to get the desired benefit as and when necessary. The present concise review emphasized mainly on the pharmaceutical and biomedical applications along with other properties of this unique system.

Keywords: Hydrogels, Biocompatible, Stimuli Materials, Pharmaceutical Applications.