Green and robust approaches towards dual-purpose dendritic adhesives: novel minimally invasive methodologies for bone fracture fixation applications
A vast number of human bone fractures rely on screw-fixated metal implants.  While being effective, their rigid design, combined with open surgical conditions and general anesthesiology, make them poor candidates for thin or fragile bones, such as those that might be found in the elderly population.  The proposal is intended to identify a minimally invasive surgical concept, based on novel bone adhesives (glues) for treatment of complicated bone fractures, under local anesthesia. This will be accomplished by developing a library comprised of a dendritic scaffold, a cross-linker and a fibre component.  Upon mixing, the dendritic component is programmed to efficiently adhere to wet bone surfaces and on-demand react with the cross-linker to form a bone adhesive patch (BAP).  The fibre component is embedded to produce BAPs covering a range of load bearing properties.