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RESEARCH REPORT |
1 IsoTis S.A., Prof. Bronkhorstlaan 10-D, 3723 MB Bilthoven, The Netherlands;
2 Biomaterials Research Group, Leiden University, The Netherlands; and
3 School of Stomatology, Wuhan University, Peoples Republic of China;
* corresponding author, jiawei.wang{at}isotis.com
| ABSTRACT |
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KEY WORDS: electrodeposition chitosan carbonate apatite octacalcium phosphate cell attachment
| INTRODUCTION |
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Chitosan is derived from partially deacetylated chitin and consists of copolymers of glucosamine and N-acetyl glucosamine. As a linear polymer, chitosan has many amino groups attached on the polysaccharide main chain that are readily available for chemical reaction and salt formation with acids (Singla and Chawla, 2001). In the past 20 yrs, chitosan has drawn considerable attention in biomedical areas, such as wound dressings (Kratz et al., 1997), cholesterol-lowering agent (Sugano et al., 1988), hemostatic agent (Malette et al., 1983), skin-grafting template (Ma et al., 2001), and drug delivery systems (Aiedeh et al., 1997; Zhang and Zhang, 2002). Composites of chitosan and calcium phosphate have also demonstrated increased osteoconductivity and biodegradation, together with sufficient mechanical strength (Muzzarelli et al., 1993, 1994; Yamaguchi et al., 2001; Xu et al., 2002). Furthermore, chitosan is found to potentiate the differentiation of osteoprogenitor cells and support the expression of extracellular matrix proteins by human osteoblasts and chondrocytes (Klokkevold et al., 1996; Lahiji et al., 2000). Therefore, we assume that incorporating chitosan into electrolytically deposited CA will improve the coating biocompatibility while maintaining its original mechanical properties.
To verify this hypothesis, we prepared an electrolytically deposited calcium phosphate/chitosan coating on Ti6Al4V plates. We investigated the hybrid coating with scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and x-ray diffractometer (XRD). Some physicochemical parameters, such as coating thickness, surface roughness, dissolution rate, and adhesive strength, were also investigated. Finally, biocompatibility was studied with the use of goat bone marrow stromal cells.
| MATERIALS & METHODS |
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Cell Attachment Test
With the approval of the Dutch Animal Care and Use Committee, bone marrow stromal cells were obtained from goat iliac crest and cultured in
-MEM medium supplemented with 15% fetal bovine serum (Life Technologies, Breda, The Netherlands), antibiotics, 0.2 mM L-ascorbic acid 2-phosphate (Life Technologies, Breda, The Netherlands), and 0.01 M ß-glycerophosphate (Sigma, Zwijndrecht, The Netherlands). The second-passage cells were seeded on Ti6Al4V plates with the ELD and ELDC coatings (0.2 g/L chitosan in solution) at 5000 cells/cm2 and cultured at 37°C with 5% CO2 and 95% air. After 1 day or 3 days, some plates were rinsed with PBS and fixed with 1.5% glutaraldehyde. The cells were either stained with 0.1% methylene blue to be observed with stereo-optical microscopy or serial-dehydrated, critical-point-dried, and sputter-coated with gold to be examined with SEM. Other plates were digested with proteinase K (Sigma, Zwijndrecht, The Netherlands) at 56°C for 16 hrs. The DNA content of cells attached to the coatings was counted with a cell proliferation assay kit (CyQuant, Leiden, The Netherlands).
Statistics
Values of critical load forces and DNA contents were expressed as means ± SD. Differences were analyzed with ANOVA, and the statistical significance was defined as P < 0.05.
| RESULTS |
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= 4.7° corresponding to the (010) plane of OCP. The crystallinity of these coatings was about 60~70%.
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The scratch test results are shown in Fig. 2
. Compared with the ELD coating, some ELDC coatings exhibited higher first-crack forces, and some of them exhibited lower ones. All ELDC coatings demonstrated higher load forces for the total delamination of the coatings. However, no statistical differences were found among these coatings (P > 0.05).
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| DISCUSSION |
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Chitosan, with more than 85% deacetylation, is known to be insoluble in alkaline conditions but dissolves easily in organic acid and takes a positive charge. When chitosan is dissolved into acidic supersaturated Ca-P solution in the presence of an electric field, two events will take place: On the one hand, calcium phosphate will precipitate on the cathodic substrate through locally increased pH, which is called electrolytic deposition (Ban and Maruno, 1998). On the other hand, positively charged chitosan will also move to the cathode by electric attraction, which is called electrophoretic deposition (Zhitomirsky, 2000). Thus, through different deposition mechanisms, a hybrid calcium phosphate/chitosan coating will be formed on the cathodic substrate. Considering the independence of these two processes, we hypothesize that chitosan will deposit adjoining the calcium phosphate crystals and fill the spaces among them. SEM micrographs have shown that chitosan is tightly entrapped within surface calcium phosphate crystals. However, further studies are required to elucidate the coatings inner structure. XRD analysis indicates little OCP phase present in the CA crystals and a decreased crystallinity of the coating. It has been reported that electrolytically deposited calcium phosphate was initially OCP, which later transferred into CA (Ban and Maruno, 1998). Therefore, we assume that the incorporation of chitosan influences calcium phosphate formation and crystallization, with the result that OCP is inhibited to transfer into CA and crystallinity is decreased. This inhibitive action of chitosan is comparable with that of some proteins, such as serum albumin and osteocalcin, which are known as crystallization inhibitors in solution (Hlady and Furedi-Mihofer, 1979; Hauschka and Carr, 1982). However, it is still not clear how chitosan affects calcium phosphate crystallization. One explanation might be that the positively charged chitosan molecules competitively bind with negatively charged phosphate ions, thus inhibiting the calcium phosphate crystals formation. Other possibilities may be that chitosan attaches to the plates to inhibit the subsequent deposition of calcium phosphate, or that viscous chitosan molecules prevent calcium and phosphate ions from moving to the cathode. In any event, this inhibitive effect seems related to the chitosan concentration in solution. Also, both coating thickness and surface roughness decrease with increasing chitosan concentration.
Compared with the ELD coating, our results show that the ELDC coating exhibited an increased dissolution rate in both acidic and neutral simulated physiological solutions. This change may mainly be caused by the incorporation of chitosan. Due to the inhibitive effect of chitosan, the lower-crystallized ELDC coating might exhibit more rapid and extensive dissolution (Maxian et al., 1993). On the other hand, previous reports have demonstrated that calcium phosphate/chitosan composites exhibited higher yielding strength (Yamaguchi et al., 2001; Xu et al., 2002). Therefore, we assume that chitosan aggregates will also enhance coating strength by virtue of their enwrapping of calcium phosphate globules. However, we find no significant differences between the strengths of the ELD and the ELDC coatings. This is possibly due to the lower amount of chitosan in the coatings. After all, since the ELD coating has demonstrated higher strength than those biomimetically deposited from solutions (Wang et al., 2004), the relatively higher strength of the ELDC coating may benefit its future application.
Turning to the coatings biocompatibility, our results demonstrate that more bone marrow stromal cells attach to the ELDC coating after 1 days or 3 days culture. Furthermore, we are interested to find that cells favorably attach to the incorporated chitosan. These findings clearly indicate that the ELDC coating is more effective for bone morrow stromal cell attachment than the ELD coating. It also confirms our hypothesis that biocompatibility is indeed increased by the incorporation of chitosan. Two factors are thought to contribute to this enhancement. The first one comes from the structure change of calcium phosphate coating. Since amorphous coatings usually show rapid and extensive dissolution at early time points, the released Ca ions will lead to reprecipitation of Ca-P, thus stimulating the differentiation of osteogenic cells (Maxian et al., 1993; Zeng et al., 1999). This point corresponds to the lower crystallinity and higher dissolution rate of the ELDC coating. The second one comes from the incorporated chitosan. It is believed that the chemical structure of chitosan resembles that of glycosaminoglycan, which is the key molecule in the extracellular matrix to modulate cell morphology and function (Lahiji et al., 2000). So, this similarity may help chitosan to enhance cell attachment. This is in line with our finding that bone marrow stromal cells favorably attached to incorporated chitosan.
In summary, the ELDC coating demonstrates improved biocompatibility while simultaneously maintaining its original strength. Considering its economic and simple production, we think it to be an attractive candidate for future clinical applications.
| ACKNOWLEDGMENTS |
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Received October 17, 2003; Last revision February 10, 2004; Accepted February 17, 2004
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