biomaterials
Biomaterials are engineered biological substances designed to interact with living systems for medical, diagnostic, or material applications. In plant science, this field encompasses the development of plant-based and plant-derived materials that leverage botanical tissues and compounds for innovative applications. This research is valuable because it enables the creation of sustainable, biodegradable alternatives to synthetic materials while advancing our understanding of how plant biochemistry can be repurposed for emerging technologies.
open_in_new WikipediaPubMed · 2026-05-06
Researchers compared two magnesium-zinc-calcium alloys as biodegradable bone implants for jaw and facial surgery, finding that the lower-zinc formula (1% Zn) degrades slowly and steadily while building a bone-like mineral coating, making it far more suitable for load-bearing implants than the higher-zinc version.
Mg1Zn0.6Ca (1% zinc) reduced its corrosion rate from 1.81 mm/year to just 0.26 mm/year over 8 weeks while reaching 65.5% hydroxyapatite crystallinity — mimicking mature bone mineral.
Mg6Zn0.6Ca (6% zinc) maintained a persistently high degradation rate (~2 mm/year), suffered premature embrittlement (flexural strength dropped to ~51 MPa vs ~89 MPa for the 1% zinc alloy), and showed declining mineral maturity.
The calcium-to-phosphorus ratio in the 1% zinc alloy rose from 0.29 to 0.68 over 8 weeks, indicating progressive bone-like mineralization, whereas the 6% zinc alloy's ratio fell from 1.42 to 0.35.