From physiological point of view, organic-inorganic composite nanofibers are envisioned promising substrates for bone tissue engineering. Biomineralization on polymeric nanofibers using simulated body fluid (SBF) is a common technique to obtain the composite nanofibers. Many factors, however, will affect the nucleation and crystal growth of deposited apatite, such as the additives like amino acids in SBF. In this study, electro spun composite nanofibers consisting of poly(L-lactide) (PLLA, 50 wt%) and gelatin (50 wt%) were soaked in 2.5 times SBF (2.5SBF) for different time periods (1, 2, 3, 5 and 7 days) to perform the biomineralization. Three amino acids (glycine, aspartic acid, or arginine) of different charge characteristics were introduced into the SBF, and their effects on nucleation and transformation of calcium phosphate depositions were systematically investigated. The results revealed that amino acids could take part in the early stage formation of pre-nucleation clusters, leading to different assemblies dependent closely on the feature of amino acid. In comparison with normal 2.5SBF, the presence of amino acid was able to enhance the preferred orientation of hydroxyapatite (HA) crystal along c axis and the transformation from amorphous calcium phosphate to hierarchical HA. The incorporation of glycine had promoted the formation of the well-evolved needle-like HA crystals in comparison with aspartic acid or arginine. It was suggested that the addition of amino acids into SBF might be a useful tool to regulate the biomineralizaiton for preparing organic-inorganic composite nanofibers. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.