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Abstract
Bioactive glass (BAG)/Poly (Lactic Acid) (PLA) composites have great potential for
bone tissue engineering. The interest in these materials is to obtain a scaffold with
tailorable properties bringing together the advantages of the composites' constituents
such as the biodegradability, bioactivity and osteoinduction. The materials studied
are PLA/13-93 and PLA/13-93B20 (20% of SiO2 is replaced with B2O3 in the 13-93 composition).
To characterize them, they were dissolved in TRIS buffer and Simulated Body Fluid
(SBF) in vitro. Over the 10 weeks of immersion in TRIS, the ion release from the composites
was constant. Following immersion in SBF for 2 weeks, the hydroxyapatite (HA) layer
was found to precipitate at the composites surface. By adding Boron, both these reactions
were accelerated, as the borosilicate glass dissolves faster than pure silicate glass
alone. Polymer degradation was studied and showed that during immersion, the pure
PLA rods maintained their molecular weight whereby the composites decreased with time,
but despite this the mechanical properties remained stable for at least 10 weeks.
Their ability to induce osteogenic differentiation of myoblastic cells was also demonstrated
with cell experiments showing that C2C12 cells were able to proliferate and spread
on the composites. The Myosin Heavy Chain and Osteopontin were tracked by immunostaining
the cells and showed a suppression of the myosin signal and the presence of osteopontin,
when seeded onto the composites. This proves osteoinduction occurred. In studying
the mineralization of the cells, it was found that BAG presence conditions the synthesizing
of mineral matter in the cells. The results show that these composites have a potential
for bone tissue engineering.