Controllable Production of Natural Silk Nanofibrils for Reinforcing Silk-Based Orthopedic Screws

ABSTRACT: As a natural high-performance material with a unique hierarchical structure, silk is endowed with superior mechanical properties. However, the current approaches towards producing regenerated silk fibroin (SF) for the preparation of biomedical devices fail to fully exploit the mechanical potential of native silk materials. In this study, using a top-down approach, we exfoliated natural silk fibers into silk nanofibrils (SNFs), through the disintegration of interfibrillar binding forces. The as-prepared SNFs were employed to reinforce the regenerated SF solution to fabricate orthopedic screws with outstanding mechanical properties (compression modulus > 1.1 GPa in a hydrated state). Remarkably, these screws exhibited tunable biodegradation and high cytocompatibility. After 28 days of degrad

SUBMITTER: Yan S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10096991 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature