Quick search Find article
Quick search
Find article

Multiwalled carbon nanotubes enhance electrochemical properties of titanium to determine in situ bone formation

FREE ARTICLE

Sirinrath Sirivisoot and Thomas J Webster1

Show affiliations


Multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) enhance osteoblast (bone-forming cell) calcium deposition compared to currently implanted materials (such as titanium). In this study, MWCNTs were grown out of nanopores anodized on titanium (MWCNT–Ti). The electrochemical responses of MWCNT–Ti were investigated in an attempt to ascertain if MWCNT–Ti can serve as novel in situ sensors of bone formation. For this purpose, MWCNT–Ti was subjected to a ferri/ferrocyanide redox couple and its electrochemical behavior measured. Cyclic voltammograms (CVs) showed an enhanced redox potential for the MWCNT–Ti. These redox signals were superior to that obtained with bare unmodified Ti, which did not sense either oxidation or reduction peaks in the CVs. A further objective of this study was to investigate the redox reactions of MWCNT–Ti in a solution of extracellular components secreted by osteoblasts in vitro. It was found that MWCNT–Ti exhibited well-defined and persistent CVs, similar to the ferri/ferrocyanide redox reaction. The higher electrodic performance and electrocatalytic activity of the MWCNT–Ti compared to the bare titanium observed in this study were likely due to the fact that MWCNTs enhanced direct electron transfer and facilitated double-layer effects, leading to a strong redox signal. Thus these results encourage the further study and modification of MWCNT–Ti to sense new bone growth in situ next to orthopedic implants and perhaps monitor other events (such as infection and/or harmful scar tissue formation) to improve the current clinical diagnosis of orthopedic implants.


PACS

87.85.Lf Tissue engineering

82.45.Yz Nanostructured materials in electrochemistry

87.17.Ee Growth and division

82.45.Tv Bioelectrochemistry

87.85.Qr Nanotechnologies-design

Subjects

Biological physics

Nanoscale science and low-D systems

Chemical physics and physical chemistry

Dates

Issue 29 (23 July 2008)

Received 10 March 2008

Published 10 June 2008



Users also read

What's this?
This innovative new feature generates a list of articles 'also read' by other users based on them reading the original article. Article abstracts citations and references are all considered and weighted accordingly. We hope that this will help you find relevant papers for your research.

  1. Type I collagen-templated assembly of silver nanoparticles and their application in surface-enhanced Raman scattering
  2. Gold nanoshell photomodification under a single-nanosecond laser pulse accompanied by color-shifting and bubble formation phenomena
  3. High-yield synthesis and optical response of gold nanostars
More

View by subject




Export








Please login to access our web services, or create an account if you don't yet have one.

You must have cookies enabled in your web browser to be able to login.

Username
Password

Forgotten your password? Get a new one here.