A typical tissue engineering approach involves combining three elements: a tissue scaffold, living cells, and cell signaling molecules, to regenerate a damaged tissue or organ. Tissue scaffold is the emerging key technology for tissue engineering applications. In this study, silane (glycidoxypropyltrimethoxy silane, GPMS) containing an epoxide group has been employed to crosslink gelatin and improve its deficient properties. However, GPMS modified gelatin has lower elasticity and hydrophobic structure due to its dense structure. These drawbacks were solved with the use of fructose as a spacer and another silane containing amine groups (aminopropyltriethoxysilane, APES) for the formation of longer bridge between two silanes. Furthermore, an "optimum" 2D or 3D silane-crosslinked system showed more wettable IPN structure due to many organic functional groups on its surface which can support cell attachment, migration and proliferation and allow interactions with biomolecules such as growth factors, providing lower toxicity. When silane modified gelatin(GS) was introduced to hydroxyapatite(HA) as a coating material, it yielded greater compressive strength and optimized the release of growth factors and stimulated osteogenic differentiation in vivo and in vitro. Also, GS, working as a DBM carrier, significantly enhanced the characteristics of DBM with adjustable load resistance, while maintaining the innate osteogenic properties of DBM. GS revealed to be a good candidate for osteoconductive and osteoinductive bone grafts, when combined with biomimetic material.
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