Abstract
Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) can support the building of flexible and porous scaffolds for bone regeneration. Various studies have looked at the mixing of CNTs with hydroxyapaptite for the formulation of bone implants. In the present work, we report the one step preparation and characterisation of chitosan/hydroxyapatite/CNTs composite materials obtained by wet precipitation of hydroxyapatite (HA) in the presence of chitosan or its amphiphilic derivative N-octyl-O-sulphate chitosan and CNTs. The in situ precipitation of HA assured inclusion of the polysaccharide and the CNTs in the HA structure and provided materials with the ability to control the release of different model drugs.