Cellulose nanocrystals reinforced gelatin/bioactive glass nanocomposite scaffolds for potential application in bone regeneration

Abstract

Simulating components, precise porous three-dimensional structure and physico-mechanical properties of natural bone have become a vital direction in the development of bone tissue regeneration. This work focused on enhancing mechanical strength of scaffold materials for bone regeneration, a subject of serious attention in its fabrication. Hence, cellulose nanocrystals (CNC), possessing favorable biocompatibility and impressive mechanical properties, was selected to reinforce the nanocomposite scaffolds of gelatin/bioactive glass (BG-Gel) system. The porous composite BG-Gel-CNC was simultaneously constructed by in-situ composite method and freeze-drying technique. The results manifested that the scaffolds incorporated with CNC showed a desirable compressive strength compared to the control, better wettability, which is conducive to better adhesion, growth and proliferation of cells. In addition, appropriate porosity, pore connectivity and biocompatibility were also demonstrated. These findings therefore suggested their potential application to function as effective scaffold materials in bone tissue regeneration.

Graphical Abstract

Keywords:

• bioactive glass
• cellulose nanocrystals
• bone regeneration
• scaffold
• gelatin

Acknowledgements

The authors would thank Zhonghui Wang (College of Biomass Science and Engineering, Sichuan University) for her great help in water contact angle determination.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 21376153) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities.