Abstract
In current therapeutic strategies, bone defects are filled up by bone auto- or allografts. Since they are limited by insufficient availability and donor site morbidity, it is necessary to find an appropriate alternative of synthetic porous bone materials. Because of their osteoconductive characteristics, ceramic materials like tricalciumphosphate (TCP) are suitable to fill up bone defects. Another advantage of TCP implants is the ability of patient-specific engineering. Objective of the present in-vitro study was to analyze the migration capacity and viability of human primary osteoblasts in porous three-dimensional TCP scaffolds in a static cell culture. To obtain data of the cellular supply with nutrients and oxygen, we determined the oxygen concentration and the pH value within the 3D scaffold compared to the surrounding medium using microsensors. After eight days of cultivation we found cells on all four planes. During incubation, the oxygen concentration within the scaffold decreased by approximately 8%. Furthermore, we could not demonstrate an increasing acidification in the core of the TCP scaffold. Our results suggest that osteoblasts could migrate and survive within the macroporous TCP scaffolds. The selected size of the macropores prevents overgrowth of cells, whereby the oxygen and nutrients supply is sufficiently guaranteed.
Highlights
Large-size bone defects can be the consequence of tumor, trauma or infections
Human primary osteoblasts were isolated under sterile conditions from bone marrow derived from femoral heads of patients undergoing primary total hip replacement
To analyze the migration potential of human primary osteoblasts, cells were seeded on the superior plane 1
Summary
Large-size bone defects can be the consequence of tumor, trauma or infections. Every year, there are more than 1.5 billion bone-grafting procedures worldwide [1]. In the past as the “Golden Standard”, defects were filled up by bone auto- or allografts [2,3]. Disadvantages of these therapeutic strategies are limited availability, risk of infections and donor-site morbidity [4,5]. It is necessary to apply appropriate synthetic, porous bone substitutes [6] which can be adapted to the bone defect. These three-dimensional (3D) scaffolds should mimic the artificial extracellular matrix (ECM) so that cells are able to migrate, proliferate and differentiate within these structures [7]. With increasing size of synthetic scaffolds, there are increasing gradients in tissue quality in terms of inhomogeneous cell proliferation and differentiation from the periphery to the core [8,9]
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