Engineering Commons^™

In Vitro Mechanical Fatigue Behavior Of Poly-Ɛ-Caprolactone Macroporous Scaffolds For Cartilage Tissue Engineering: Influence Of Pore Filling By A Poly(Vinyl Alcohol) Gel, J A. Panadero, L Vikingsson, J L. Gomez Ribelles, Senentxu Lanceros-Méndez, Vitor Sencadas

Faculty of Engineering and Information Sciences - Papers: Part A

Polymeric scaffolds used in regenerative therapies are implanted in the damaged tissue and submitted to repeated loading cycles. In the case of articular cartilage engineering, an implanted scaffold is typically subjected to long-term dynamic compression. The evolution of the mechanical properties of the scaffold during bioresorption has been deeply studied in the past, but the possibility of failure due to mechanical fatigue has not been properly addressed. Nevertheless, the macroporous scaffold is susceptible to failure after repeated loading-unloading cycles. In this work fatigue studies of polycaprolactone scaffolds were carried by subjecting the scaffold to repeated compression cycles in conditions simulating …