| Materials communicate with their environment through their interfaces. For the past 50 years, researchers have made dramatic progress in the comprehension and characterization of such types of communication, developing the fields of materials and surface science.{09}Simultaneously, biologists and biochemists made a lot of progress in understanding interactions between living cells and their environment. Therefore, to design a successful biomaterial, we must merge both the knowledge of materials science and the knowledge of cell biology. Chapter 1 gives a brief introduction of advances in both fields.; A successful biomaterial is designed in a way that reduces non-specific interactions with biological materials, such as proteins or cells. Polyethylene glycol (PEG) is widely used due to its protein repelling properties and its biocompatibility. In Chapter 2, we tried to understand better the anti-adhesive properties of PEG by mimicking PEG surfaces using different alkanethiols terminated with cyclic acetals and by studying their adhesion properties.; The incorporation of adhesion peptides (such as RGD) in biomaterials might also be interesting to study and develop new kinds of implants. Different methods such as self-assembled monolayers and microcontact printing have been used to functionalize surfaces with peptides. In Chapter 3, we developed, in collaboration with Dr. West (Rice University), a new and easy technique to prepare a master for use in microcontact printing, utilizing a virtual mask and a laser-scanning confocal microscope. To demonstrate the efficiency of this technique, we patterned gold surfaces with RGDS and PEG moieties, and cultured cells on the resulting patterned surfaces.; In the process of making surfaces to study cell adhesion, we encountered some difficulties to obtain the final thiol for different synthetic reasons. Thioacetate, often used as protecting group for thiols, is usually removed at the end of the synthesis. Unfortunately, several common deprotection steps failed in my case. Some researchers have used thioacetates rather than thiols to form self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) on gold. To evaluate the potential of this new technique, Chapter 4 presents the surface properties of normal alkanethioacetates on gold as well as a kinetic study of their adsorption and comparison to SAMs formed from normal alkanethiols. |
