Interactions between Saos-2 cells and microtextured amorphous diamond or amorphous diamond hybrid coated surfaces with different wettability properties

Amorphous diamond (AD) has been shown to be a potential coating material for biomedical devices, such as hip prostheses. In the current study, we have investigated the adhesion and contact guidance of human primary osteogenic sarcoma cells (Saos-2) on AD, AD-titanium-hybrid (AD-Ti-h) and AD-polydimethylsiloxane-hybrid (AD-PDMS-h) with different water contact angles i.e. 72.4°, 81.9° and 100.0°. Microtextured arrays were fabricated onto silicon wafers by using ultraviolet lithography and ultra short pulsed laser deposition (USPLD) of AD coatings. The surface energy parameters were calculated in order to understand the influence of Ti or PDMS on wettability of AD. Saos-2 cells were cultured on the arrays for 24 and 48 h. Environmental scanning electron microscope (ESEM), confocal laser scanning microscopy and MTT assays were used to analyze cell attachment. The results suggest that AD and its hybrids are good coating material candidates with respect to their interactions with osteoblast-like cells. The efficiency of microtexturing in contact guidance was also demonstrated. MTT staining revealed that AD-PDMS-h had the lowest proliferation rate of osteoblast-like cells compared to AD (p < 0.01) or AD-Ti-h (p < 0.05). Pure AD evoked the highest proliferation rate of cells, though it was not significantly different from AD-Ti-h coating.