Titanium-hydroxyapatite composites sintered at low temperature for tissue engineering: in vitro cell support and biocompatibility

ROMINA COMÍN; MARIANA P. CID; LUCIANO GRINSCHPUN; CARLOS R. OLDANI; NANCY A SALVATIERRA; N. A. SALVATIERRA

Journal of Applied Biomaterials & Functional Materials

Wichtig Publishing

Año: 2017 vol. 15 p. 176 - 183

Introduction: In clinical orthopedic, a critical problem is the bone tissue loss produced by a disease or injury and it is requires bone repairs and substitutes. The use of composites from titanium and hydroxyapatite for biomedical applications has increased due to the resulting advantageous combination of hydroxyapatite bioactivity and the favorable titanium mechanical properties. Powder metallurgy is a simple and lower cost method that uses powder from titanium and hydroxyapatite to obtain composites having hydroxyapatite phases in a metallic matrix. However, this method has certain limitations arising from thermal decomposition of hydroxyapatite in the titanium-hydroxyapatite system around 1200ºC. In this work, we obtained a composite from titanium and bovine hydroxyapatite sintered at 800°C and evaluated the in vitro biocompatibility according to ISO 10993 standard.Methods: The MTT assay was carried out to assess cytotoxicity on Vero and NIH3T3 cell lines. In addition, the cell morphology and cell adhesion on the composite surface were analyzed using fluorescence and SEM microscopy. Results: Our data did not reveal any toxicity of titanium-hydroxyapatite composite in epithelial Vero or fibroblastic NIH3T3 cells. Moreover, composite extracts did not affect the cell morphology or density. Finally, NIH3T3 cells were capable to adhere and proliferate on the composite surface. Conclusion: We obtained a composite with promising biomedical application through a simple method as powder metallurgy. Our results supplied in vitro proof of an adequate biocompatibility of titanium-hydroxyapatite composite when it sintered at a low temperature.