Abstract

Repair of bone defects with irregular shapes or at soft tissue insertion sites faces a huge challenge. Scaffolds capable of adapting to bone cavities, generating stiffness gradients, and inducing osteogenesis are necessary. Herein, a superelastic 3D ceramic fibrous scaffold is developed by assembly of intrinsically rigid, structurally flexible electrospun SiO 2 nanofibers with chitosan as bonding sites (SiO 2 NF-CS) via a lyophilization technique. SiO 2 NF-CS scaffolds exhibit excellent elasticity (full recovery from 80% compression), fast recovery rate (>500 mm min −1 ), and good fatigue resistance (>10 000 cycles of compression) in an aqueous medium. SiO 2 NF-CS scaffolds induce human mesenchymal stem cell (hMSC) elongation and differentiation into osteoblasts. In vivo self-fitting capability is demonstrated by implanting compressed SiO 2 NF-CS scaffolds into different shaped mandibular defects in rabbits, with a spontaneous recovery and full filling of defects. Rat calvarial defect repair validates enhanced bone formation and vascularization by cell (hMSC) histomorphology analysis. Further, subchondral bone scaffolds with gradations in SiO 2 nanofibers are developed, leading to a stiffness gradient and spatially chondrogenic and osteogenic differentiation of hMSCs. This work presents a type of 3D ceramic fibrous scaffold, which can closely match bone defects with irregular shapes or at different implant sites, and is promising for clinical translation.