Investigation Of Physiochemical Properties Of A Novel Gradient Calcium Polyphosphate Bone Scaffold And Its Influence On Cellular Behavior

INVESTIGATION OF PHYSIOCHEMICAL PROPERTIES OF A NOVEL GRADIENTCALCIUM POLYPHOSPHATE BONE SCAFFOLD AND ITS INFLUENCE ONCELLULAR BEHAVIORByLIANG CHENDecember 2013Advisor: Dr. Weiping RenMajor: Biomedical EngineeringDegree: Master of ScienceA good designed bone scaffold is crucial to bone tissue engineering. We have developedand characterized a novel gradient bone scaffold by combination of Calcium Polyphosphate(CPP) with different size of porogen (stearic acids). Compared with homogenous scaffold, thegradient bone scaffold with different pore size and porosity can better mimic natural bonestructure. Directly perfusion flow bioreactor was developed. This 3D dynamic cell culture wasbetter mimic the physiological condition for cell growth. It was beneficial to nutrition andoxygen delivery throughout the whole scaffold and was able to form shear stress. We wanted toinvestigate the effect of the gradient structure on murine M 3T3 cells’ behavior after dynamiccell culture. We hypothesize that the adhesion, proliferation and differentiation of osteogenic cells on gradient scaffolds are significantly enhanced, compared to that in homogenous scaffold. The porosity, degradation rate and mechanical properties of gradient and homogenousscaffolds had been investigated. The total porous volume and degradation rate were similarbetween two scaffolds. While pore size and porosity on 1stand 2ndlayer of the gradient scaffold