Chapter One – Development of Polymer/Nanodiamond Composite Coatings to Control Cell Adhesion, Growth, and Functions

Keremidarska M, Hristova K, Hikov T, Radeva E, Mitev D, Tsvetanov I, Presker R, Drobne D, Drašler B, Novak S, Kononenko V, Eleršič K, Pramatarova L, Krasteva N
[ pdf ] [ site ] Advances in Planar Lipid Bilayers and Liposomes, 2015

The identification of biomaterials that support appropriate cellular attachment, proliferation, and functions is critical for tissue engineering and cell therapy. There is a growing interest in functional organic/inorganic composites where a small amount of nanometer-sized material yields better physicochemical properties for cells to attach, grow, and differentiate. In this work, we prepared polymer/nanodiamond composite layers based on hexamethyldisiloxane and detonation-generated nanodiamond (DND) particles, in which the particles were either embedded into a polymer matrix or deposited on the preliminary formed plasma-polymerized (PP) layer. The surface properties of composites, such as roughness and wettability, as well as adhesion, growth, and functions of osteosarcoma MG-63 cells and primary rat mesenchymal stem cells were studied. We aimed to investigate the influence of the incorporation methods of DND into the polymer on the material surface properties and the cell response in order to control them by manipulating diamond-containing composite surfaces. We found differences between both composites in respect to their physicochemical properties and to the cell behavior suggesting that the method of particle incorporation into polymers should be taken in account during the development of new biomaterials for a specific application.