PLGA from PolySciTech used in research on bone tissue repair materials.

 
Bone tissue can not heal if the damage to an area of the bone is larger than a certain size (referenced as a critical defect size). In this case the bone may heal around the damage but can not bridge the gap to fill it in. In this case, often, a bone-scaffold material is surgically implanted to provide for improved healing. Recently, researchers at Southern Medical University (China) and The Pennsylvania State University developed novel biomaterials to test for their ability to provide for guided regeneration of bone. PLGA (AP154) from PolySciTech (www.polyscitech.com) was used as a comparison item to provide control data for biocompatibility and other parameters. This research holds promise to improve bone repair due to injury or disease. Read more: Guo, Jinshan, Xinggui Tian, Denghui Xie, Kevin Rahn, Ethan Gerhard, Michelle Laurel Kuzma, Dongfang Zhou et al. "Citrate‐Based Tannin‐Bridged Bone Composites for Lumbar Fusion." Advanced Functional Materials (2020): 2002438. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/adfm.202002438

“Conventional bone composites consistently fail to mimic the chemical composition and integrated organic/inorganic structure of natural bone, lacking sufficient mechanics as well as inherent osteoconductivity and osteoinductivity. Through a facile surface coating process, the strong adhesive, tannic acid (TA), is adhered to the surface of the natural bone component, hydroxyapatite (HA), with and without the immobilization of in situ formed silver nanoparticles. Residual functional groups available on the immobilized TA substituents are subsequently covalently linked to the citrate‐based biodegradable polymer, poly(octamethylene citrate) (POC), effectively bridging the organic and inorganic phases. Due to the synergistic effects of the tannin and citrate components, the obtained citrate‐based tannin‐bridged bone composites (CTBCs) exhibit vastly improved compression strengths up to 323.0 ± 21.3 MPa compared to 229.9 ± 15.6 MPa for POC‐HA, and possess tunable degradation profiles, enhanced biomineralization performance, favorable biocompatibility, increased cell adhesion and proliferation, as well as considerable antimicrobial activity. In vivo study of porous CTBCs using a lumbar fusion model further confirms CTBCs' osteoconductivity and osteoinductivity, promoting bone regeneration. CTBCs possess great potential for bone regeneration applications while the immobilized TA additionally preserves surface bioconjugation sites to further tailor the bioactivity of CTBCs.”