Fabrication and characterization of bioactive chitosan microspheres incorporated with mesoporous silica nanoparticles for biomedical applications

Mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSNs) were prepared using sol-gel method. Chitosan-MSNs microspheres scaffold loaded with ciprofloxacin also prepared via an ionotropic gelation method. The prepared samples were characterized using FE-SEM, TEM, FTIR and XRD analysis. The pore volume and mean pore diameter for MSNs was determined by the Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) method. The in vitro drug test was evaluated by using UV-Vis spectrophotometry at lambda(max) of 275 nm. The estimated (measured) MSNs pore volume and pore diameter were 0.9227 cm(3)/g and 2.6058 nm, respectively. The Chitosan-MSNs loaded with ciprofloxacin show a spherical surface with good and uniform distribution of the MSNs in the microspheres. The in vitro drug release confirms that the MSNs containing beads shows a retarding release (approximate to 90% in 9 h) than beads without MSNs (approximate to 90% in 2 h). In the light of these findings, the developed delivery system scaffold holds great potential for bone regeneration by control drug release used in activation osteoblast cells.