Agaroz-jelatin karışımı hidrojellerde kalsiyum fosfat liesegang desenlerinin uzam-zamansal oluşumu

Liesegang patterns (LPs) are periodic structures formed by the concurrent diffusion and reaction of ions under non-equilibrium conditions, occurring both in natural systems and artificial settings. Since their discovery, several studies have been conducted to understand the mechanism and the effect of experimental parameters on pattern formation. Biomineralization, on the other hand, is a process that involves controlled nucleation, growth, and orientation of inorganic compounds by organic matrices. One of the common biomineralization processes in nature is the mineralization of calcium phosphates (CaP), which makes up an important proportion of human hard tissues, such as bones or enamel. The biological formation of calcium phosphates is hard to study since they are accompanied by many other complex biological processes. In this work, we aim to create an artificial system of CaP LPs in agarose-gelatin blends in varying proportions to mimic biological media. Such blends can serve as effective protein-polysaccharide scaffolds to simulate biomineralization environments due to their close resemblance to natural scaffolds. The chemical understanding of pattern formation, e.g., determining the identity and the morphology, can be useful in many applications, such as developing biocomposite ceramic materials, implants, and curing some diseases. Therefore, properties of CaP products formed in blend hydrogel samples were investigated under different experimental conditions, such as concentration, pH, and temperature, to understand how minerals form and adapt under varying parameters. The study reveals a hierarchical spatial arrangement of morphological within-band variety for the first time, alongside many other crucial observations based on the changes in experimental conditions. Thus, we believe that this work might offer new insights into understanding the evolutionary pathway of the biomineralization process, developing biomimetic composite ceramic materials, as well as contributing to the fundamentals of precipitation and mineralization processes.