Graphene oxide assists polyvinylidene fluoride scaffold to reconstruct electrical microenvironment of bone tissue
Cijun Shuai, Zichao Zeng, Youwen Yang, Fangwei Qi, Shuping Peng, Wenjing Yang, Chongxian He, Guoyong Wang, Guowen Qian
Abstract
Polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF), as a typical piezoelectric polymer, has a great potential in reconstructing the electrical microenvironment of bone tissue. In present study, graphene oxide (GO) was introduced into PVDF scaffold manufactured via selective laser sintering, aiming to enhance piezoelectric effect of PVDF by increasing β phase content. In detail, the oxygen-containing functional groups of GO could form strong hydrogen bonding with fluorine groups of PVDF. The interaction would force the fluorine groups to be arranged in parallel and perpendicular to the polymer chain, thereby inducing the transformation from α phase to β phase. Results demonstrated that the PVDF/0.3GO scaffold with improved β phase exhibited the maximal output voltage (~8.2 V) and current (~101.6 nA), which were improved by 82.2% and 68.2%, respectively, in comparison with pure PVDF. In vitro cell culture confirmed that enhanced electrical charges could significantly improve cell behavior. Moreover, the scaffold presented a 97.9% increase in compressive strength and 24.5% increase in tensile strength, which was attributed to GO reinforcements forming strong interaction with PVDF chains. These positive results suggested that the scaffold might have possible application in bone tissue engineering.