Preparation and characterization of bone scaffolds from polycaprolactone by solvent-casting and solute-leaching techniques

Abstract

Bone scaffolding materials were fabricated by solvent-casting and soluteleaching techniques from polycaprolactone filled with hydroxyapatite particles (HAp) or ipriflavone (IP) Sucrose, as the porogen, was used to generate an openpore structure. The pores created by leaching away the sucrose particles were uniformly distributed and interconnected with average pore diameters in the range of 400-500 um. The pore interconnectivity of the scaffold was found to increase with increasing the amount of sucrose. The increased porosity corresponded to the lower compressive modulus, which was consistent with the inverse tendency observed between porosity and mechanical properties. The incorporation of HAp caused the scaffolds to be more rigid, as HAp obstructed the molecular movement of the matirix Alkali hydrolysis was performed to improve the hydrophilicity of the PCL scaffolds. Increasing both the concentration of and the submersion time in the NaOH solution caused the water absorption of the scaffolds to increase. In vitro biocompatibility of the PCL scaffolds with or without the incorporation of HAp or IP was tested with mouse osteoblasts (MC3T3-E1) Without HAp or IP, the majority of the cells appeared to be in the spindle shape on the surface of the scaffold. However, the cells exanded over the surface of the scaffolds when either HAp or IP was incorporated.