Facile Fabrication of Composite Scaffolds for Long-Term Controlled Dual Drug Release

Abstract

Bone tuberculosis (TB) caused by mycobacterium tuberculosis continues to present a formidable challenge to humans. To effectively cure serious bone TB, a novel kind of composite scaffolds with long-term dual drug release behaviours were prepared to satisfy the needs of both bone regeneration and antituberculosis drug therapy. In virtue of an improved O/W emulsion technique, water-soluble isoniazid (INH)-loaded gelatin microparticles were obtained by tailoring the content of β-tricalcium phosphate (β-TCP), which played significant roles in INH entrapment efficiency and drug release behaviours. By mixing with the poly(ε-caprolactone)-block-poly (lactic-co-glycolic acid) (b-PLGC) solution containing oil-soluble rifampicin (RFP) via the particle leaching combined with phase separation technique, the dual drugs-loaded composite scaffolds were fabricated, which possessed interconnected porous structures and achieved the steady release of INH and RFP drugs for three months. Moreover, this dual drugs-loaded system could basically achieve their expectant roles of respective drugs without obvious influences with each other. This strategy on preparation of intelligent composite scaffolds with the multi-drugs loading capacity and controlled long-term release behaviour will be potential and promising substrates in clinical treatment of bone tuberculosis.

Advances of Naturally Derived and Synthetic Hydrogels for Intervertebral Disk Regeneration

“…Hydrogels, possessing 3D cross-linked network structures, tunable physicochemical properties and similar structures of extracellular matrix (ECM) for the cell adhesion and proliferations, have attracted a great deal of attentions in IVD regeneration ( Shu et al, 2006 ; Wang et al, 2017a , 2018a , 2020 ; Bao et al, 2019 , 2020 ; Zhu et al, 2019 ; Fan et al, 2020 ; Li et al, 2020a ; Liu H. Y. et al, 2020 ). The hydrogel designs contemplate the implant performance in terms of structural integrity, biocompatibility, biodegradability, safety, solute transport of cellular behavior, mechanical strength, and low viscosity.…”