A technique to immobilize bioactive proteins, including bone morphogenetic protein-4 (BMP-4), on titanium alloy

Immobilization of biomolecules on surfaces enables both localization and retention of molecules at the cell–biomaterial interface. Since metallic biomaterials used for orthopedic and dental implants possess a paucity of reactive functional groups, biomolecular modification of these materials is challenging. In the present work, we investigated the use of a plasma surface modification strategy to enable immobilization of bioactive molecules on a “bioinert” metal. Conditions during plasma polymerization of allyl amine on Ti–6Al–4V were varied to yield 5 (“low”)- and 12 (“high”)-NH2/nm2. One- and two-step carbodiimide schemes were used to immobilize lysozyme, a model biomolecule, and bone morphogenetic protein-4 (BMP-4) on the aminated surfaces. Both schemes could be varied to control the amount of protein bound, but the one-step method destroyed the activity of immobilized lysozyme because of crosslinking. BMP-4 was then immobilized using the two-step scheme. Although BMP bound to both low- and high-NH2 surfaces was initially able to induce alkaline phosphatase activity in pluripotent C3H10T1/2 cells, only high amino group surfaces were effective following removal of weakly bound protein by incubation in cell culture medium.