The effect of additional zinc oxide to antibacterial property of chitosan/collagen-based scaffold

The bone scaffold is susceptible to infection in its application due to the bacteria that often appear on the surface. To prevent this phenomenon, the scaffolds need to be modified in order to provide antibacterial properties. In this study, the bone scaffold was fabricated from chitosan-collagen with the addition of zinc oxide as an antibacterial agent. There were four variables of the amount of zinc oxide added to the scaffold: 0%, 1%, 3%, and 5%. The method used was Thermally Induced Phase Separation (TIPS). From this study, a porous scaffold with a rough surface was obtained. SEM image of the scaffold showed that more zinc oxide caused smaller pore and lower porosity. Characterization with FTIR proved that the scaffold obtained from this process has the same functional group as chitosan and collagen. The DSC-TGA curve confirmed that the heating process performed on dehydrothermal treatment (DHT) did not cause degradation of the scaffold because chitosan and collagen have higher degradation temperatures than DHT temperatures. In addition, this study also proved that the addition of zinc oxide had successfully provided the scaffold with antibacterial properties in which the protection against bacteria was related to the amount of zinc oxide in direct proportion.