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U. look to nature for bone-mending glue: Research ? Marine worm secretions binds underwater particles
Nov 25, 2008 (The Salt Lake Tribune - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) --
While on sabbatical on the California coast, Utah bioengineer Russell Stewart immersed himself with an inch-long sandcastle worm that builds its subtidal habitat by gluing bits of sand and shell and other ocean particles together with its own secretions.
Could such a substance be the basis for a bioadhevise to speed the healing of human bone fractures? It's very possible, according to a new study by Stewart and other University of Utah scientists. Mimicking the chemistry of the worm secretions, the team synthesized a glue that can bind bones in a wet environment while they heal. Stewart hopes to have a prototype ready for human testing in five to 10 years.
"We don't see the glue replacing the big piece of hardware [used in treating fractures]. This will be used to glue the small pieces back in, especially for joints faces. They are precise surfaces," Stewart said. Testing the glue required stops at local grocers for bovine soup bones.
"I asked the butcher to saw them in pieces, centimeter cubes," Stewart said. He applied the glue to the bone cubes and wrapped them in wet gauze to replicate the moist conditions associated with bone fractures. Testing revealed the bonds were 37 percent as strong as those of commercial toxic superglues used for fixing household items.
Stewart's findings are to be published on-line with a week in the journal Macromolecular Biosciences. Co-authors are Hui Shao, a doctoral student in bioengineering, and Kent
Bachus, a research associate professor of orthopedics.
The home-building process of the worm, Phragmatopoma californica, offers an intriguing contrast with how most other organisms mineralize bone and shells, according to Herb Waite, a UC Santa Barbara biochemist with whom Stewart studied during his 2004 sabbatical.
"We lay down an organic matrix, then we mineralize that matrix from scratch. The calcium and phosphate have to be transported there. That's why our bones repair slowly," said Waite, a professor in Santa Barbara's Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology and an investigator with its Marine Sciences Institute.
"The sandcastle worm decided not to invest in building minerals molecule by molecule because they want to build quickly. They say to the waves, 'You supply me with the minerals and I'll build something hard with it," Waite continued. "The worm uses its tentacles to collect the particles and inspect them, not only for shape and size, but also for chemistry."
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