Engineering the biological performance of hierarchical nanostructured poly(ε-carpolactone) scaffolds for bone tissue engineering

Scaffolds play an important role as physical substrates for cell proliferation and differentiation, leading to tissue regeneration. For bone applications, researchers are focusing on cellular or acellular biocompatible biodegradable polymeric scaffolds. However, high biological performance scaffolds are still required to meet actual clinical demands. This paper discusses a novel strategy to engineer the biological performance of polymeric scaffolds through the combined use of additive manufacturing, acetone vapour annealing surface treatment and dopamine grafting, enabling the fabrication of hierarchical nanostructured tissue engineering structures. Produced scaffolds present improved biological behaviour compared to conventional additive manufactured scaffolds, and similar mechanical properties, showing high potential for clinical applications.