Magnesium and many of its alloys are bioresorbable metals with mechanical properties closely aligned to natural bone. Its degradation (corrosion) products are postulated to stimulate osteogenic differentiation of mesenchymal stem cells. As such, these materials hold great promise for developing a new generation of orthopaedic devices and bone tissue engineering scaffolds with biomimetic mechanical properties, tailored corrosive degradation and resorption as well as preferential stimulation of osteogenesis. Since the implant would eventually degrade away, this also eliminates the need for a second surgery for hardware removal, and it would minimize the risk of a chronic foreign body reaction that can lead to fibrous bone healing and encapsulation of implants.  

Mark Ehrensberger, PhD

• Brooks EK, Der S, Ehrensberger MT. “Corrosion and Mechanical Performance of AZ91 Exposed to Simulated Inflammatory Conditions.” Materials Science and Engineering: C, Materials for Biological Applications. 2016.
• Brooks EK, Tobias ME, Yang S, Bone LB, Ehrensberger MT. “Influence of MC3T3-E1 Preosteoblast Culture on the Corrosion of a T6 Heat Treated AZ91 Alloy.” Journal of Biomedical Materials Research, Part B, Applied Biomaterials. 2016; 104(2).