Amine-Rich Cell-Culture Surfaces for Research in Orthopedic Medicine

We report results of ongoing research relating to cell immobilization and cell culture on bioactive organic coatings deposited using three different techniques—two plasma assisted, the third based on vacuum-ultraviolet photo-polymerization. We start by briefly com - paring those three methods and by describing some of the key characteristics of the resulting coatings; all are designed to be rich in primary amines, a functional group known to be highly bioactive. Next, we focus on two cell types of importance to long-term objectives in our orthope- dic research laboratory: (i) The first, nonadherent human U937 monocytes, is a cell line that has been widely used as a model of the mammalian cellular response to various inflammatory stimu - li, and in understanding the clinical relevance of elevated cobalt and chromium levels in patients with metal-on-metal total hip arthroplasty and hip resurfacing arthroplasty. (ii) The second cell type, adherent human mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs), derived from patients suffering from osteoarthritis (OA), is important in biological repair of cartilage and of the degenerate interver- tebral disc (IVD) from the patients' autologous cells. Much progress has been achieved in both cases, as illustrated with results based to a considerable extent on real-time reverse-transcription (RT) polymerase chain reaction (PCR), a key methodology used in this type of research.