Interaction of preosteoblasts with surface-immobilized collagen-based nanotubes

• Collagen-based nanotubes were immobilized on ITO glass by electrophoretic deposition.
• Preosteoblasts were cultured on the obtained biointerfaces.
• Direct cell interaction with the nanotubes was observed.
• Immobilized nanotubes do not impart obvious cytotoxicity to the material.

In a previous work, we demonstrated the successful use of electrophoretic deposition (EPD) to immobilize collagen-based nanotubes onto indium-tin-oxide-coated glass (ITO glass), leading to the creation of biointerfaces with protein-based chemistry and topography [1]. In this work, we present a first study of preosteoblasts behavior in contact with surface-immobilized collagen-based nanotubes. Changes in cell morphology after their interaction with ITO glass modified with collagen-based nanotubes were studied using fluorescence microscopy and compared to those observed on virgin ITO glass as well as on ITO glass on which a collagen layer was simply adsorbed. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) was used to study interactions of cell filopodias with the deposited nanotubes. Cytotoxicity of these biointerfaces was examined as well in short term cultures, using Alamar blue assay.Cells showed particular morphologies on ITO glass coated with nanotubes compared to virgin ITO glass or collagen adsorbed layer on ITO glass. High resolution SEM images suggest that apart from cell morphology, length and thickness of filopodias seem to be significantly affected by surface modification with collagen-based nanotubes. Moreover, nanotube-coated ITO glass did not show any obvious cytotoxicity in short term culture, opening new perspectives for the surface modification of biomaterials. We show the versatility of the proposed surface modification procedure by tailoring biointerfaces with a mixture of micro- and nanometer-scale collagen-based tubes.

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