Evaluation of Porous Nerve Guide Conduits Filled with Bilobalide and Made of Braided Poly-lactic Acid

• Main Authors: Yen-Ting Huang, 黃彥廷
• Other Authors: 吳宏乾
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2007
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/44198830223211673719

碩士 === 中國醫藥大學 === 中國醫學研究所碩士班 === 95 === Evaluation of Porous Nerve Guide Conduits Filled with Bilobalide and Made of Braided Poly-lactic Acid Yen-Ting Huang Major professor: Hung-Chien Wu Graduate Institute of Chinese Medical Science, China Medical University Nerve bridging technique is one of the most potential methods to repair injured nerves. Investigators have tried different biocompatible and biodegradable nerve conduit materials, such as collagen, gelatin, polyesters, glycolic and lactic acid polymers. In these materials, the PLA is thermoplastic which can be made to silk yarns by melting treatment. In recent studies, it has been shown that a nerve conduit with a larger surface area is good for cell adhesion and growth. In addition, a permeable conduit with large pore sizes on the walls can provide pathways for interchanges between metabolites and nutrients. The pores can anchor the fibroblasts, thus decreasing the contraction on the growing axons and increasing the degradation rate. Moreover, bilobalide has been proven to promote nerve regeneration. In this experiment, we used PLA fibers to make nerve guide conduits which weighed 0.0255 g ± 3% and about 1.74 mm in inner diameter with uniform pores by using textile techniques. We filled the conduits with collagen and bilobalide at a concentration of 100 μ M to bridge the dissected rat sciatic nerve with a 10 mm gap. Eight weeks later, we found that the conduits were not obviously degraded, and the success percentage of nerve regeneration reached 100%. However, the growing axons were immature, and large variations were noted in nerves. No significant difference was seen for the nerves regenerated in the empty PLA tubes and those filled with collagen or bilobalide. Key words: peripheral nerve regeneration, textile techniques, porous nerve guide conduit, PLA, bilobalide