Bioactive glass scaffold with similar structure and mechanical properties of cancellous bone

Natural bone is an amazing material because of its structure and mechanics. It is a challenge to find a bone substituted material mimicking natural bone intended to suffice for the need for bone repair and regeneration. In this study, a biomorphic material with similar structure and mechanical properties of cancellous bone has been fabricated by using demineralized cancellous bone as a template. Well-oriented particles in the pore walls could be observed clearly. The compressive strength of this scaffold was up to about 4.9 +/- 0.2MPa, close to the lower limit of the natural bone and 30 times of bioactive glass scaffolds, even though the porosity was up to 90%. This kind of bioactive glass composite scaffolds presented high resistance to deformation and showed an excellent shape restoration property. It is very close to a natural cancellous bone with a similar macro- and micro-structure and force-extension behavior. These results suggested this material would have a good potential in bone tissue engineering. (C) 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Biomed Mater Res Part B: Appl Biomater 95B: 449-455, 2010.