| In order to successfully implant abiotic materials and functional devices into living tissue, the problems of inflammation and encapsulation at the implant needs to be addressed and overcome. The goal of this project is to increase cell/surface interactions between electrode surfaces and neurons. Increased adhesion is expected to lead to greater stability in electrical recording and stimulation of tissue samples in contact with similarly coated electrode arrays. Several polypeptide chains are known to have cell adhesive properties, the peptides of interest are: RGDS, which is adhesive to many cells and basement membranes, IKVAV, which is selective to hippocampal neurons, and KHIFSDDSSE, which is selective to cortical astrocytes. These polypeptides are being immobilized onto titanium nitride (TiN) and being investigated for increased cell adhesion to hippocampal neurons. Some properties being investigated are the directionality of the peptide (N-terminus side up or C-terminus side up) as well as the sequence (RGDS vs. RDGS). Cell cultures with the various peptides mentioned have shown that IKVAV modified TiN substrates have the greatest surface coverage of hippocampal neurons after a 2 week incubation period. |
