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Project Objective

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The aim of this R&D project is to increase the biocompatibility of dental implants using a bioactive coating produced by a sol-gel process. This nanostructured coating will function as a vehicle for immobilization of biological species like proteins and peptides, and will also be used for the controlled release of therapeutic agents.

Project Justification

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One of the main goals of research in implantology nowadays is to design devices that induce controlled, guided, and rapid healing, being able to replace lost tissues and restoring body functions to improve human health.  

Titanium is the most commonly used material to produce dental implants due to its excellent mechanical properties.  It has, however, some severe limitations that appear mainly during the first two months when the release of metallic particles due to the corrosion process in a biological medium, reduces the activity of osteoblasts.  One way to avoid these problems, is to cover the surface of the implants with a bioactive degradable coating that can at the same time be used to incorporate biological compounds and drugs to obtain multifunctional prosthesis.

Scientific approach

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In the sol-gel process, an alkoxide undergoes hydrolysis in the presence of water with an acid or basic catalyst, and the silanols produced condense forming a SiO2 network. Using metal alkoxides with organic chains, it is possible to obtain organic-inorganic coatings to cover metal surfaces. The last decade has seen a revolution in the area of sol-gel derived materials that have proved to be a good way to improve biocompatibility, bioactivity and bone conductivity of the metallic surfaces of the implants, and that can also be used to encapsulate biological species such as enzymes, antibodies and other proteins in a functional state.  Our approach is based on:

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• Metal alkoxides used as metalorganic sol-gel precursors with different chemical characteristics to immobilize the biomolecules by physical adsorption, covalent binding, entrapment or microencapsulation
• Biological species with different grade of complexity to better characterize the coating behavior to immobilization and delivery