Preparation and mineralization of three-dimensional carbon nanofibers from bacterial cellulose as potential scaffolds for bone tissue engineering

Nanofibers exist widely in human tissue and designing three-dimensional (3-D) nanofibrous tissue engineering has important implications. For the first time to our knowledge, this article described the construction of 3-D nanofibrous carbon scaffolds for potential bone tissue regeneration which are composed of carbon nanofiber (CNF) and hydroxyapatite (HAp). CNFs were obtained by carbonization under inert conditions with 3-D bacterial cellulose nanofibers as starting carbon sources. The resulting CNFs showed 3-D fibrous structural features with diameter ranging from 10 to 20 nm. In vitro biomineralization process was performed on the surface-treated 3-D CNFs. The resultant CNF/HAp composites were investigated using scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microcopy, Raman spectroscopy, and X-ray diffraction. The results showed that surface treatment of CNFs in nitric acid promoted the mineralization and changed the morphology of HAp formed on CNFs. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.