Natural biopolymer chitosan has been investigated widely for a variety of biomedical applications due to its excellent biocompatibility and biodegradability.The toughness of chitosan porous scaffolds is good

but the strength is low.It is suggested that the coating treatment of hydroxyapatite will improve the strength and osteoconductivity of the scaffolds

and maintain the toughness still.In this research

the electrochemistry assisted deposition method was used to deposit hydroxyapatite on the pores’ surface of porous scaffolds.Calcium and phosphate ions in anode and cathode solutions moved directionally in the electric field

reached the internal of scaffolds and reacted and deposited

so the organic-inorganic composite scaffold was obtained.The composition

morphology

inorganic deposition amount

porosity and compressive strength were characterized by XRD

SEM

calcination

porosity measurement

and compression experiment.It was shown that the hydroxyapatite coating with low crystallinity deposited on the pores’ surface of scaffolds.The coating was uniform and dense at low magnification

but there was a great deal of micropores in the deposition layer at high magnification

and some spheres on the layer composed of small hydroxyapatite lamellae.After being treated 6 h

the deposition amount was 2.81% of total weight

and the porosity was decreased from 96.0% to 89.8%.The compressive strength of the treated scaffold was increased to 0.0998 MPa comparing with 0.0550 MPa of the chitosan scaffold.