Chiral Hydroxyapatite Coatings for Improving Bone In‐Growth of Porous Tantalum Scaffold via FAK‐Notch1 Signaling Pathway

With the rising prevalence of osteoarthritis, joint arthroplasty is becoming increasingly common in clinical practice. Prosthesis loosening is a primary factor contributing to the failure of joint arthroplasty, closely linked to inadequate bone in-growth. In recent years, porous tantalum has increasingly become a widely used anti-loosening material due to its good biocompatibility and mechanical properties. However, such metallic material itself only possesses limited bioactivity or osteogenic properties. To further enhance the bone integration performance of porous tantalum, a reasonable approach is to introduce specific coatings onto the porous tantalum. The ideal coating material should possess a chiral microstructure similar to that of natural bone. Hence, a kind of chiral hydroxyapatite coating is developed, which is wrapped around the surface of porous tantalum, theoretically exhibits higher bone ingrowth characteristics. The results are promising. In vitro, when bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BMSCs) interacted with the left-chiral hydroxyapatite (L-CHAP) coating, their osteogenic differentiation potential is significantly enhanced through the FAK-Notch1 signaling pathway. In vivo, rats in the L-CHAP group demonstrated the most substantial bone in-growth into the scaffold among all groups. This study presents a novel and straightforward strategy for creating highly effective anti-loosening tantalum implants, providing valuable clinical implications for overcoming various clinical challenges related to poor bone ingrowth, enriching the body of knowledge on how chiral material works.