Innovative Biomimetic Hybrid Composites to Repair Multifunctional Anatomical Region

The development of biomimetic materials for osteochondral tissue substitution and repair can be the start for a revolution in the classical procedures of orthopaedic surgery. The persisting problems, linked to the absence of a complete functional recovery of the articulation and to the stabilization and protraction of the half-life of an articular prosthesis can be overcome by the new class of osteochondral substitutes. The characteristics of the artificial bone tissue are drastically different from those of the natural one and this is mainly due to the absence of the peculiar self-organizing interaction between apatite crystals and proteic matrix. At this purpose a biomimetic approach was used in which apatitic phases are directly nucleated on different macromolecular matrices, which act as template and induce peculiar physico-chemical features in the mineral phase to create a substitute for osteochondral lesions. In particular a biologically inspired approach was applied to nucleate bone-like hydroxyapatite (HA) nanocrystals on self-assembling collagen fibers. Biohybrid composite materials were obtained mimicking composition, structure and morphology of human osteochondral interfaces. [1–4]