Comparison of Fibroblast and Nerve Cells Response on Plasma Treated Poly (L-lactide) Surface

Plasma technique can easily be used to introduce desired functional groups or chains onto the surface of materials, and so it has a special application to improve the cell affinity of polymers surfaces. The purpose of this study is to elucidate the interaction between the cells and the surface of crystalline poly (L-lactide) (PLLA) samples, which were modified using a low-temperature plasma treatment apparatus. The plasma treatments were carried Out ill the carbon dioxide (CO2) gas. The results showed that the contact angle of the samples, which was plasma treated ill CO2 gas, decreased compared with that of the untreated samples. The hydrophilicity increased because of the introduction of oxygen-containing functional groups onto the PLLA Surfaces according to the spectroscopy for chemical analysis. High quantities of -C-O groups, such as hydroxyl and carboxyl could be in corporate into the Surface of PLLA. The surface wettability, topography, and chemistry of treated PLLA samples were characterized by contact angle measurement, scanning electron microscope (SEM), and ATR-FTIR spectroscopy. The origin and plasma-treated samples were used to investigate the interaction of two different types of cells namely, B65 glial nervous, and L929 fibroblast cells. The nervous cell response on the PLLA plasma treated in the CO2 gas were significantly superior to that of the L929 fibroblast cells and untreated one. The surface modification technique used in this study may be applicable to tissue engineering for the improvement of nerve tissue compatibility of polymer and scaffold-type substrates. (C) 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 112: 3429-3435, 2009