Professor Michael Malkoch, Royal Institute of Technology, School of Engineering Sciences in Chemistry, Stockholm, Sweden

Click composites as adhesives fixators toward brighter health care solutions of bone fractures and dental restorations

Hospital visits are a constant reminder to Humans on how fragile our body is. At any given moment our body tissue can be compromised due to various unfortunate events. Careless children, active athletes, physical working environment and elderly are typical high risk groups and frequent hospital visitors. In this case, bone fractures belong to most typical accidents and surgeons are often faced with more challenging surgeries that require metal implants fixators. Harsh mechanical drilling into healthy bone with screws and metal plate, for adequate fixation of the fracture, is a painful and long journey for any patient. Consequently, surgeons are one lookout for alternative fixation methods that eliminate the use of old-fashion metal-based implants.

This presentation will focus on current research activities that capitalizes on a novel materials concepts and surgical methodologies for fixation of bone fractures and dental restorations. In this context, highly robust click reactions are utilized for selective buildup of “Fiber Reinforced Adhesive Patches” (FRAP)[1] - as a modular, facile and mild fixation methodology for an array of bone fractures that today are considered inaccessible due to sensitive locations, near joints or when drilling is not an option. The FRAPs are accomplished by introducing a phosphonic primer layer as a critical component, that is programmed to strongly adhere to wet bone surfaces and “on-fracture-site” bind two a two-component resin system with imbedded hydroxyapatite and PET fibre mesh. From surgical viability point-of-view, the FRAP is produced under physiologically benign conditions using dental High-Energy Visible light applicator as a benign curing source. As a implant, the FRAP is biocompatible, none-degradable composite fixator that deliver unprecedented bone fixation, up to 5 kg/cm², and can withstand a minimum of 1000 cycles in fatigue tests. The adhesion strength of the FRAP surpasses commercially available dental restoration materials and can compete with metal fixation implants for an array of common fractures e.g. finger, radius, ankle and maxillofacial.

Collectively, these high-performance “clickable” adhesive fixators can match the unlimited demand from the healthcare sector including dentistry[2] with the ultimately goal of increasing the quality of life for patients, reducing rehabilitation time and the overall healthcare costs.

Host: Associate Professor Alex Zelikin, iNANO & Dept. of Chemistry, AU