0000000000322561
AUTHOR
G. Conoscenti
PLLA Scaffold via TIPS for Bone Tissue Engineering
Tissue engineering offers a promising new approach to repair bone fractures, fractures that do not heal, and fractures due to bone tumors. In this work, two different approaches were tested in order to obtain Poly-L- Lactic Acid (PLLA) porous scaffolds via Thermally Induced Phase Separation (TIPS) for bone tissue engineering application. First, the possibility to produce a composite material, by incorporating Hydroxyapatite (HA) particles in a Poly-L-lactic acid (PLLA) matrix was investigated. Two PLLA/HA weight ratios (70/30 and 50/50) were tested. The results showed that the presence of HA does not influence the phase separation process, i.e. the composite scaffolds microstructure is simi…
PLLA-BASED SCAFFOLDS FOR OSTEOCHONDRAL TISSUE REGENERATION VIA THERMALLY INDUCED PHASE SEPARATION TECHNIQUE
L’ingegneria tessutale (TE) è una scienza multidisciplinare che mira a progettare e sviluppare sostituti biologici per migliorare, riparare e/o sostituire i tessuti negli organismi umani. Sulla base della tipica triade dell’ingegneria tessutale è incentrato il primo capitolo Scaffold, Source and Signal; lo scaffold funge da struttura tridimensionale, le cellule rappresentano la source mentre il bioreattore fornisce gli adeguati segnali chimico/fisici. In questo lavoro di tesi sono stati presi in considerazione tutti e tre questi aspetti avendo come obiettivo la rigenerazione osteocondrale. La guarigione dei difetti osteocondrali, riguardanti le lesioni della cartilagine che si esten- dono f…
Evaluation of hydroxyapatite distribution in a Poly-L-Lactic Acid (PLLA) scaffolds via Micro Computed Tomography (µCT)
Bone Tissue Engineering offers promising clinical alternative substitutes for bone defects, focusing on the use of polymer/ceramic composites. Hydroxyapatite (HA), a bioactive ceramic, has been implemented in bone substitution and regeneration due to its biocompatibility, osteoconductivity and close resemblance to the mineralized phase of human bone. Several techniques have been adopted to characterize composite scaffolds in terms of morphology, pore size and interconnection, filler content and distribution, but most of them are destructives. In this work, composite Poly-L-Lactic Acid (PLLA)-HA scaffolds (17.6 mm diameter and35.7 mm height) were prepared via Thermally Induced Phase Separati…