Abstract
The surface properties of composite films are important to know for many applications from the industrial domain to the medical domain. The physical and chemical characteristics of film/membrane surfaces are totally different from those of the bulk due to the surface segregation of the low surface energy components. Thus, the surfaces of cellulose acetate/silica composite films are analyzed in order to obtain information on the morphology, topography and wettability through atomic force microscopy (AFM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and contact angle investigations. The studied composite films present different surface properties depending on the tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) content from the casting solutions. Up to a content of 1.5 wt.% TEOS, the surface roughness and hydrophobicity increase, after which there is a decrease in these parameters. This behavior suggests that up to a critical amount of TEOS, the results are influenced by the morphology and topographical features, after which a major role seems to be played by surface chemistry—increasing the oxygenation surfaces. The morphological and chemical details and also the hydrophobicity/hydrophilicity characteristics are discussed in the attempt to design biological surfaces with optimal wettability properties and possibility of application in tissue engineering.
Highlights
Progress has been made in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine concerning the design and manufacture of scaffolds for cell growth and development used in tissue repair
The films subjected to analysis were cast from cellulose acetate (CA)/tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) solution of 10 g/dL concentration, obtained through sol-gel technique that allows the formation of silica nanoparticles—protocol presented in detail in a previous study [22]
The cellulose films were in the solidfilm statesurfaces and, implicitly, morphology and acetate/silica topography ofcomposite the corresponding filminsurfaces [26,27]
Summary
Progress has been made in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine concerning the design and manufacture of scaffolds for cell growth and development used in tissue repair. Given that the workability of this polymer is limited by low solubility in different solvents or that some cellulosic materials do not have specific properties that meet the requirements of daily life, the development of new compounds/systems based on cellulose with improved characteristics is pursued. Through chemical (introduction of functional groups) or physical changes (mixing with various compounds) it will be possible to obtain new high-performant cellulosic materials of different forms (hydrogels, films, fibers). These materials will find applicability in various fields including the medical one as drug delivery systems, prosthetic devices or scaffolds for cell culture [2,3]. There is a continuous interest and a challenge for researchers in the use of cellulose materials and especially of the cellulose materials surfaces due to the physico-chemical processes that take place at the cellulose/cellulose interface and cellulose/different media
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