Glass Reflections
Cambridge 7th to 9th September



Presenting Author:
Jamie Christie
<J.K.Christie@lboro.ac.uk>

article posted 22 Mar 2015

Jamie Christie

Dr Jamieson Christie is a lecturer in the Department of Materials at Loughborough University, a post he took up in 2015 after research positions at University College London and The Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Trieste, and a PhD at the University of Cambridge.

His research interests are in the computer simulation of glass, particularly biomedically relevant compositions. Much of a particular composition's suitability for biomedical implantation can be understood from a characterization of its atomic structure and Jamie has used a range of computational techniques to improve our understanding of these connections.






Understanding the solubility of bioactive phosphate-based glass

Jamieson K. Christie1*, Richard I. Ainsworth2, Devis Di Tommaso3, Nora H. de Leeuw4


Phosphate-based glasses (PBG) have wide application as biomaterials because they dissolve when implanted into the body, with a composition-dependent dissolution rate that varies over several orders of magnitude. They can be synthesised containing different substances or materials, making them useful for controlled delivery of therapeutically relevant substances. In order to optimise PBGs for these applications, it is vital to understand the dependence of their dissolution rate on the glass composition and structure. We have used molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to understand these relationships at the atomistic level. Classical MD simulations [1] with a polarizable force field [2] show that for biomedically relevant compositions (<50 mol % P2O5, and some Na2O and CaO) where the dissolution rate substantially decreases with increasing CaO content, Ca binds together more phosphate chains (3.9) than Na does (3.2), strengthening the glass network and making it less prone to dissolution.


The inclusion of therapeutic ions alters the glass structure and properties in non-trivial ways which are accessible to simulation. First-principles MD has predicted that fluorinated PBGs do not have the same inhomogeneities as fluorinated silicate glass, opening up their use as biomaterials for dental treatment [3]. Silver is an antibiotic, and we have suggested that Ag/Na substitution will not affect the biological activity of the glass [4]. We have characterised the strontium environment in PBGs [5] and its (negligible) effect on the glass's suitability for biomedicine.



Institutions:

1 Department of Materials, Loughborough University

2 Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, San Diego

3 School of Biological and Chemical Sciences, Queen Mary, University of London

4 Department of Chemistry, University of Cardiff