Electrospinning of polyvinyl alcohol/chitosan/zinc oxide nanofibers for bone tissue engineering

Abstract

Tissue engineering has advantages over allograft and autograft for bone tissue regenerations because it only induces minor immune system responses and does not require a second surgery to procure donor bone from patients own body. Also, there is an increasing risk of infection when more surgeries are performed. One of the applications of tissue engineering is the fabrication of the extracellular matrix (ECM)-like scaffolds, providing the structural support to cells due to its structure of meshwork. Chitosan is a biodegradable and biocompatible material and more importantly it can improve osteoblast cell differentiation and proliferation. PVA is an artificial synthetic polymer, which is another biocompatible material that can help facilitate the electrospinning process. ZnO is well-known for its antibacterial property. Differently shaped ZnO could show different degree of antibacterial effect. In this study, chitosan/polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) scaffolds with antibacterial properties were prepared by electrospinning a polymer solution with a small amount of zinc oxide (ZnO) particles with different shapes and crosslinked by glutaraldehyde. Morphology of the scaffolds was characterized using electron scanning microscopy. Human fetal osteoblasts (hFOBs) were seeded on chitosan/PVA/ZnO scaffold. The cell assay showed that electrospun chitosan/PVA/ZnO scaffold did not improve hFOBs proliferation, but promoted the alkaline phosphatase activity and calcium secretion, both are key biomarkers of osteogenic mineralization. The composite nanofibers inhibited antibacterial activities of 60% against Staphylococcus epidermidis.