Optimized electro- and wet-spinning techniques for the production of polymeric fibrous scaffolds loaded with bisphosphonate and hydroxyapatite

• Autor(a) principal: Puppi, D.
• Data de Publicação: 2011
• Outros Autores: Piras, A. M., Chiellini, F., Chiellini, E., Martins, Albino, Leonor, I. B., Neves, N. M., Reis, R. L.
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/1822/12818
• topic: electrospinning; wet-spinning; star polymers; bisphosphonates; scaffolds; tissue engineering; Science & Technology

This research activity was aimed at the development of composite bioactive scaffolds made of biodegradable three-arm branched-star poly(ε-caprolactone) (∗PCL), hydroxyapatite nanoparticles (HNPs) and clodronate (CD), a bisphosphonate that has demonstrated efficacy in the treatment of various bone diseases and as an anti-inflammatory drug. During the experimental work, the processing conditions for the fabrication of fibrous meshes, by either electrospinning or wetspinning, were optimized. Stemming from a previous research activity on electrospinning of ∗PCL, ∗PCL/HNPs 3D meshes were developed, evaluating the influence of fabrication parameters on the fibres’ morphology. By exploiting the binding affinity of bisphosphonates for hydroxyapatite, a methodology was set up for obtaining a physical linkage between CD and HNPs, with the aim of having a dual bioactive system loaded into ∗PCL fibrous mats. Fibres loaded with either CD or CD–HNP particles were thus produced and analysed by scanning electron microscopy for their morphology and by energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy for their elemental composition