Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Hyderabad and Dr B R Ambedkar National Institute of Technology (NIT) Jalandhar Researchers have developed a process by which bone implant materials can be synthesized from waste eggshells.
This Research seeks to produce bone substitute materials such as β-tricalcium phosphate (β-TCP), a commonly-used bone substitute material from natural sources, without the use of toxic chemicals.
The natural source of choice of the IIT Hyderabad researcher is eggshells. Eggshells are made of largely calcium containing minerals (95.1 per cent) along with small amounts of proteins and water, a statement in Hyderabad said on Wednesday.
The use of graft materials to heal bone defects has been known for a long time. Sushruta Samhita, an ancient Sanskrit text on medicine and surgery, describes ‘Asthipoorana’ or bone grafting in which materials having calcium were combined with the latex of the banyan tree to form bone substitutes.
In modern medicine, damaged and missing bones are replaced with bone from either patient or donor or using artificial materials containing calcium, such as Plaster of Paris, and more recently, phosphate compounds like hydroxyapatite and calcium phosphate. Since the earliest recorded successful bone transplantation was carried out in 1668 by Van Meek’ren, a Dutch surgeon, more than 50 bone substitutes have been tested and tried.
This Research paper has been co-authored by Mr Roopavath Uday Kiran, PhD Student, Department of Biomedical engineering, IIT Hyderabad, Dr Mahesh Kumar Sah, Assistant Professor, Department of Biotechnology, Dr B R. Ambedkar National institute of Technology – Jalandar, Dr Bharat B. Panigrahi, Associate professor, Department of Material Science and Metallurgical Engineering, IIT Hyderabad and Dr Subha Narayan Rath, Associate professor, Department of Biomedical engineering, IIT Hyderabad.
(UNI)
