Browsing by Author "Mujtaba, M."

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Open Access
Chitosan loses innate beneficial properties after being dissolved in acetic acid: Supported by detailed molecular modeling
(American Chemical Society, 2020-12) Bilican, İsmail; Önses, M. S.; Akyüz, L.; Altuner, E. M.; Koc-Bilican, B.; Zang, L.-S.; Mujtaba, M.; Mulerčikas, P.
Chitosan, which is obtained via deacetylation of chitin, has a variety of uses in agriculture, food, medicine, pharmaceuticals, and cosmetics. Industrial chitosan is in a gel form, which is produced by dissolving in acetic acids. These gels can be chitosan-only films or composite films that include other ingredients such as plant extracts or other polymers. Chitosan-based films, however, are not as natural as chitosan dissolved in weak acids, and they lack some of chitosan’s innate properties. In this study, natural chitosan films (NCFs) were obtained from the pupa shells of black soldier flies through a process that maintains the original structure. The semisynthetic film (SCF) was then produced by dissolving the same NCF in acetic acid along with glycerol and glutaraldehyde. The semisynthetic film remarkably lost the beneficial properties of the natural film. The deteriorated characteristics include hydrophobicity, crystallinity, thermal properties, as well as a loss of fibril structure and a reduction in bacterial attachment. Moreover, the Ag-deposited NCFs manifested strikingly higher surface-enhanced Raman scattering activity as compared with the semisynthetic ones. These results, including the molecular modeling data, demonstrate that dissolving chitosan in acetic acid changes its polymeric structure.
Open Access
Sponge-derived natural bioactive glass microspheres with self-assembled surface channel arrays opening into a hollow core for bone tissue and controlled drug release applications
(Elsevier, 2020) Kaya, M.; Bilican, İ.; Mujtaba, M.; Sargın, İ.; Erginer-Hasköylü, M.; Toksoy-Öner, E.; Zheng, İ.; Boccaccini, A. R.; Cansaran-Duman, D.; Önses, M. S.; Torun, İ.; Akyüz, L.; Elbüken, Çağlar
Porous, bioactive microspheres have always been a dream material to biomedical scientists for bone regeneration and drug delivery applications due to their interconnectivity, unique pore geometry, encapsulation ability and porosity spanning macroscopic, microscopic and nanoscopic length scales. Extensive efforts have been made to produce such materials synthetically at a great cost of money, time and labor. Herein, naturally-assembled multifunctional, open-channeled and hollow bioactive micro silica spheres (diameter 209.4 ± 38.5 µm) were discovered in a marine sponge (Geodia macandrewii), by peeling the outer surface of the sterrasters using hydrogen fluoride. The obtained micro silica spheres exhibited valuable characteristics such as homogeneously distributed pores, a cavity in the center of the sphere, and channels (approx. 3000) opening from each pore into the central cavity. Simulated body fluid analysis demonstrated the bioactivity of the micro silica spheres; whereas, no bioactivity was recorded for the original untreated sterrasters. The non-cytotoxicity and osteogenic ability of the isolated microspheres were confirmed through osteoblast cell culture. Finally, these silica based porous microspheres were tested for controlled drug release capacity. The spheres showed excellent loading and release abilities for an anti-cancer drug, carboplatin, in simulated solutions and in human cancer cell culture, HeLa, through a real time cell analyzer system. The drug loading capacity of the porous beads was determined as 10.59%. Considering the unique biological and physicochemical properties, these novel bioactive silica spheres, which we name as giant macroporous silica (GMS), are promising materials for a range of applications including bone tissue engineering and drug delivery.