Characterization of Silk Fibroin/S-carboxymethyl Kerateine Surfaces: Evaluation of Biocompatibility by Contact Angle Measurements

Surface characterization of materials has been considered critical in the development of biomaterials, as many unfavorable responses from the body occur at the interface between a material and the body component. The contact angle measurement is one means to characterize the surface properties and to correlate them to the biocompatibility of materials. In this paper, surface characteristics of silk fibroin/S-carboxymethyl kerateine, representative fibrous proteins, were investigated by contact angle measurements of ESCA. The biocompatibility of the blends was evaluated based on minimal interfacial free energy concept, and compared with other potential biomaterials. It was also hypothesized that the enhanced surface polarity of the blends was generated from the conformational transition of proteins. This approach to evaluate the biocompatibility of materials based on surface characteristics may find wide utility in many biomedical applications.