• Journal of Biosystems Engineering
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• v.32 no.1 s.120
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• pp.50-56
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• 2007

Highly porous composite bioceramic bone scaffolds were developed using sintered gnotobiotic pig bones. These scaffolds consisted of poly-D,L-lactic acid (P(D,L)LA) and bioceramic materials of pig bone powder. The bone scaffolds were able to promote biocompatibility and possess interconnected pores that would support cell adhesion and proliferation adequately. The composite scaffolds were tested with dental pulp stem cells for cytotoxicity test. Cells seeded on the composite scaffolds were readily attached, well proliferated, as confirmed by cytotoxicity test, and cell adhesion assessment. The composite bone scaffold had no toxicity in cytotoxicity test on the extract of 0.013 g scaffold to 2 ml culture medium. The cells on the composite bone scaffold proliferated better than cells on the P(D,L)LA scaffolds.

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2009.11a
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• pp.12.1-12.1
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• 2009

Nano-hydroxyapatite (N-HAp)has shown the pivotal role in producing bone-regenerative materials since it has similarity to natural bone minerals in terms of size, morphology, and the composition. Currently, the combination of biopolymers and N-HAp is recognizedas an attractive approach in generating hybrid scaffolds for bone tissueengineering. Surface engineering is an important issue since it determines whether cells can effectively adhere and proliferate on porous scaffolds. We aim to develop a synthetic approach to porous 3D scaffolds by immobilizing N-HAp on pore surfaces. The discrete nano-level anchoring of N-HAp on the scaffold pore surface is achieved using surface-repellent stable colloidal N-HAp with surface phosphate functionality. This rational surface engineering enables surface-anchored N-HAp to express its overall intrinsic bioactivity,since N-HAp is not phase-mixed with the polymers. The porous polymer scaffolds with surface-immobilized N-HAp provide more favorable environments thanconventional bulk phase-mixed polymer/N-HAp scaffolds in terms of cellular interaction and growth. In vitro biological evaluation using alkalinephosphatase activity assay supports that immobilized N-HAp on pore surfaces of polymer scaffolds contributed to the more enhanced in vitro osteogenicpotential. Besides, the scaffolds with surface-exposed N-HAp provide favorable environments for enhanced in vivo bone tissue growth, estimated by characteristic biomarkers of bone formation such as collagen. The results suggest that newly developed hybrid scaffolds with surface-immobilized N-HApmay serve as a useful 3D substrate with pore surfaces featuring excellent bonetissue-regenerative properties. Acknowledgement. This research was supported by a grant (code #: 2009K000430) from 'Center for Nanostructured Materials Technology' under '21st Century Frontier R&D Programs' of the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, Korea.

• Proceedings of the Materials Research Society of Korea Conference
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• 2012.05a
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• pp.56.2-56.2
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• 2012

Clinically-favored materials for bone regeneration are mainly based on bioceramics due to their chemical similarity to the mineral phase of bone. A successful scaffold in bone regeneration should have a 3D interconnected pore structure with the proper biodegradability, biocompatibility, bioactivity, and mechanical property. The pore architecture and mechanical properties mainly dependent on the fabrication process. Bioceramics scaffolds are fabricated by polymer sponge method, freeze drying, and melt molding process in general. However, these typical processes have some shortcomings in both the structure and interconnectivity of pores and in controlling the mechanical stability. To overcome this limitation, the rapid prototyping (RP) technique have newly proposed. Researchers have suggested RP system in fabricating bioceramics scaffolds for bone tissue regeneration using selective laser sintering, powder printing with an organic binder to form green bodies prior to sintering. Meanwhile, sintering process in high temperature leads to bad cost performance, unexpected crystallization, unstable mechanical property, and low bio-functional performance. The development of RP process without high thermal treatment is especially important to enhance biofunctional performance of scaffold. The purpose of this study is development of new process to fabricate ceramic scaffold at room temperature. The structural properties of the scaffolds were analyzed by XRD, FE-SEM and TEM studies. The biological performance of the scaffolds was also evaluated by monitoring the cellular activity.

• Maxillofacial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.323-332
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• 2008

Aim of the study: Scaffolds are crucial to tissue engineering/regeneration. Biodegradable polymer/ceramic composite scaffolds can overcome the limitations of conventional ceramic bone substitutes such as brittleness and difficulty in shaping. In this study, poly(L-lactide)/hydroxyapatite(PLLA/HA) composite scaffolds were fabricated for in vivo bone tissue engineering. Material & methods: In this study, PLLA/HA composite microspheres were prepared by double emulsion-solvent evaporation method, and were evaluated in vivo bone tissue engineering. Bone marrow mesenchymal stem cell from rat iliac crest was differentiated to osteoblast by adding osteogenic medium, and was mixed with PLLA/HA composite scaffold in fibrin gel and was injected immediately into rat cranial bone critical size defect(CSD:8mm in diameter). At 1. 2, 4, 8 weeks after implantation, histological analysis by H-E staining, histomorphometric analysis and radiolographic analysis were done. Results: BMP-2 loaded PLLA/HA composite scaffolds in fibrin gel delivered with osteoblasts differentiated from bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells showed rapid and much more bone regeneration in rat cranial bone defects than control group. Conclusion: This results suggest the feasibility and usefulness of this type of scaffold in bone tissue engineering.

• Proceedings of the Polymer Society of Korea Conference
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• 2006.10a
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• pp.179-179
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• 2006

PLGA/HA composite scaffold fabricated by GF/PL method showed enhanced mechanical property, hydrophilicity and osteoconductivity compared with the SC/PL scaffolds, and this enhancement was most likely due to a higher extent of exposure of HA particles to the scaffold surface. The biodegradable polymer/bioceramic composite scaffolds fabricated by the GF/PL method could enhance bone regeneration efficacy for the treatment of bone defects compared with conventional composite scaffolds.

• Journal of Computational Design and Engineering
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• v.3 no.4
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• pp.385-397
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• 2016

Scaffolds are essential in bone tissue engineering, as they provide support to cells and growth factors necessary to regenerate tissue. In addition, they meet the mechanical function of the bone while it regenerates. Currently, the multiple methods for designing and manufacturing scaffolds are based on regular structures from a unit cell that repeats in a given domain. However, these methods do not resemble the actual structure of the trabecular bone which may work against osseous tissue regeneration. To explore the design of porous structures with similar mechanical properties to native bone, a geometric generation scheme from a reaction-diffusion model and its manufacturing via a material jetting system is proposed. This article presents the methodology used, the geometric characteristics and the modulus of elasticity of the scaffolds designed and manufactured. The method proposed shows its potential to generate structures that allow to control the basic scaffold properties for bone tissue engineering such as the width of the channels and porosity. The mechanical properties of our scaffolds are similar to trabecular tissue present in vertebrae and tibia bones. Tests on the manufactured scaffolds show that it is necessary to consider the orientation of the object relative to the printing system because the channel geometry, mechanical properties and roughness are heavily influenced by the position of the surface analyzed with respect to the printing axis. A possible line for future work may be the establishment of a set of guidelines to consider the effects of manufacturing processes in designing stages.

• Macromolecular Research
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.565-572
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• 2006

Recombinant human bone morphogenic protein-2 (rhBMP-2), which is known as one of the major local stimuli for osteogenic differentiation, was immobilized on the surface of hyaluronic acid (HA)-modified poly$(\varepsilon-caprolactone)$ (PCL) (HA-PCL) scaffolds to improve the attachment, proliferation, and differentiation of human bone marrow stem cells (hBMSCs) for bone tissue engineering. The rhBMP-2 proteins were directly immobilized onto the HA-modified PCL scaffolds by the chemical grafting the amine groups of proteins to carboxylic acid groups of HA. The amount of covalently bounded rhBMP-2 was measured to 1.6 pg/mg (rhBMP/HA-PCL scaffold) by using a sandwich enzyme-linked immunosorbant assay. The rhBMP-2 immobilized HA-modified-PCL scaffold exhibited the good colonization, by the newly differentiated osteoblasts, with a statistically significant increase of the rhBMP-2 release and alkaline phosphatase activity as compared with the control groups both PCL and HA-PCL scaffolds. We also found enhanced mineralization and elevated osteocalcin detection for the rhBMP-2 immobilized HA-PCL scaffolds, in vitro.

• Journal of Computational Design and Engineering
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• v.1 no.3
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• pp.194-201
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• 2014

Optimization of design is an important step in obtaining tissue engineering scaffolds with appropriate shapes and inner micro-structures. Different shapes and sizes of scaffolds are modeled using UGS NX 6.0 software with variable pore sizes. The quality issue we are concerned is the scaffold porosity, which is mainly caused by the fabrication inaccuracies. Bone scaffolds are usually characterized using a scanning electron microscope, but this study presents a new automated inspection and classification technique. Due to many numbers and size variations for the pores, the manual inspection of the fabricated scaffolds tends to be error-prone and costly. Manual inspection also raises the chance of contamination. Thus, non-contact, precise inspection is preferred. In this study, the critical dimensions are automatically measured by the vision camera. The measured data are analyzed to classify the quality characteristics. The automated inspection and classification techniques developed in this study are expected to improve the quality of the fabricated scaffolds and reduce the overall cost of manufacturing.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.35 no.11
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• pp.1237-1242
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• 2011

Calcium phosphates are very interesting materials for use as scaffolds for bone tissue engineering. These materials include hydroxyapatite (HA) and tricalcium phosphate (TCP), which are inorganic components of human bone tissue and are both biocompatible and osteoconductive. Although these materials have excellent properties for use as bone scaffolds, many researchers have used these materials as additives to synthetic polymer scaffolds for bone tissue regeneration, because they are difficult to manufacture three-dimensional (3D) scaffolds. In this study, we fabricated 3D calcium phosphate scaffolds with the desired inner and outer architectures using solid freeform fabrication technology. To fabricate the scaffold, the sintering behavior was evaluated for various sintering temperatures and slurry concentrations. After the fabrication of the calcium phosphate scaffolds, in-vitro cell proliferation and osteogenic differentiation tests were carried out.

• Macromolecular Research
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.158-167
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• 2002

In order to endow with new bioactive functionality from small intestine submucosa (SIS) powder as natural source to poly (L-lactide) (PLA) and poly (lactide-co-glycolide) (PLGA) synthetic biodegradable polymer, porous SIS/PLA and SIS/PLGA as natural/synthetic composite scaffolds were prepared by means of the solvent casting/salt leaching methods for the possibility of the application of tissue engineered bone and cartilage. A uniform distribution of good interconnected pores from the surface to core region was observed the pore size of 40~500 ${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$ independent with SIS amount using the solvent casting/salt leaching method. Porosities, specific pore areas as well as pore size distribution also were almost same. After the fabrication of SIS/PLA hybrid scaffolds, the wetting properties was greatly enhanced resulting in more uniform cell seeding and distribution. Five groups as PGA non-woven mesh without glutaraldehyde (GA) treatment, PLA scaffold without or with GA treatment, and SIS/PLA (Code No.3 ; 1 : 12 of salt content, (0.4 : 1 of SIS content, and 144 ${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$ of median pore size) without or with GA treatment were implanted into the back of nude mouse to observe the effect of SIS on the induction of cells proliferation by hematoxylin and eosin, and von Kossa staining for 8 weeks. It was observed that the effect of SIS/PLA scaffolds with GA treatment on bone induction are stronger than PLA scaffolds, that is to say, in the order of PLA/SIS scaffolds with GA treatment > PLA/SIS scaffolds without GA treatment > PGA nonwoven > PLA scaffolds only with GA treatment = PLA scaffolds only without GA treatment for the osteoinduction activity. The possible explanations are (1) many kinds of secreted, circulating, and extracellular matrix-bound growth factors from SIS to significantly affect critical processes of tissue development and differentiation, (2) the exposure of SIS to GA resulted in significantly calcification, and (3) peri-implant fibrosis due to covalent bonding between collagen molecule by crosslinking reaction. In conclusion, it seems that SIS plays an important role for bone induction in SIS/PLA scaffolds for the application of tissue engineering area.