Departamento de Ingeniería Mecánica, Grupo de Investigación en Fabricación Integrada y Avanzada, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Las Palmas, Spain.
Unidad de Investigación, Hospital Universitario de Gran Canaria Doctor Negrín, Las Palmas, Spain.
J Biomed Mater Res B Appl Biomater. 2023 Feb;111(2):429-441. doi: 10.1002/jbm.b.35162. Epub 2022 Sep 7.
Polylactic acid (PLA) has been extensively used for the manufacturing of scaffolds in bone tissue engineering applications. Due to the low hydrophilicity and the acidic degradation process of this biomaterial, different strategies have been proposed to increase the biofunctionality of the support structure. The use of ceramic particles is a generally preferred option to increase the osteoconductivity of the base material, while acting as buffers to maintain the pH level of the surroundings tissues. Surface modification is another approach to overcome the limitations of PLA for tissue engineering applications. In this work, the degradation profile of 3D-printed PLA scaffolds containing beta-tricalcium phosphate (β-TCP) and calcium carbonate (CaCO ) particles has been studied under hydrolytic conditions. Composite samples treated with plasma and coated with Aloe vera extracts were also studied to evaluate the effect of this surface modification method. The characterization of the 3D structures included its morphological, calorimetric and mechanical evaluation. According to the results obtained, the proposed composite scaffolds allowed an adequate maintenance of the pH level of the surrounding medium, with no effects observed on the morphology and mechanical properties of these structures. Hence, these samples showed potential to be further investigated as candidates for bone tissue regeneration.
聚乳酸（PLA）已广泛应用于骨组织工程应用中支架的制造。由于这种生物材料的低亲水性和酸性降解过程，已经提出了不同的策略来提高支撑结构的生物功能性。使用陶瓷颗粒是增加基础材料骨诱导性的常用选择，同时充当缓冲剂以维持周围组织的 pH 值。表面改性是克服 PLA 用于组织工程应用的局限性的另一种方法。在这项工作中，研究了含有β-磷酸三钙（β-TCP）和碳酸钙（CaCO₃）颗粒的 3D 打印 PLA 支架在水解条件下的降解情况。还研究了经过等离子体处理和涂覆有芦荟提取物的复合样品，以评估这种表面改性方法的效果。3D 结构的表征包括其形态、热分析和机械评估。根据获得的结果，所提出的复合支架允许周围介质的 pH 值得到适当的维持，这些结构的形态和机械性能没有观察到任何影响。因此，这些样品有潜力进一步研究作为骨组织再生的候选物。
