Alternate soaking enables easy control of mineralized collagen scaffold mechanics from nano- to macro-scale.

Alternate soaking enables easy control of mineralized collagen scaffold mechanics from nano- to macro-scale. J Mech Behav Biomed Mater. 2020 Oct;110:103863 Authors: Grue BH, Vincent LC, Kreplak L, Veres SP Abstract The mechanical properties of biologic scaffolds are critical to cellular interactions and hence functional response within the body. In the case of scaffolds for bone tissue regeneration, engineered scaffolds created by combining collagen with inorganic mineral are increasingly being explored, due to their favourable structural and chemical characteristics. Development of a method for controlling the mechanics of these scaffolds could lead to significant additional advantages by harnessing the intrinsic mechnotransduction pathways of stem cells via appropriate control of scaffold mechanical properties. Here we present a method for controlling the macroscale flexural modulus of mineralized collagen sheets, and the radial indentation modulus of the sheets' constituent collagen fibrils. Scaffolds were created starting with sheets of highly aligned, natively structured collagen fibrils, prepared via cryosectioning of decellularized tendon. Sheets underwent an alternate soaking mineralization procedure, with sequential exposure to citrate-doped calcium and carbonate-containing phosphate solutions, both of which included poly aspartic acid. The extent of scaffold mineralization was controlled via number of repeated mineralizatio...
Source: Journal of the Mechanical Behavior of Biomedical Materials - Category: Materials Science Authors: Tags: J Mech Behav Biomed Mater Source Type: research