No abstract

Commercially pure Titanium (cp‐Ti) and its alloys are the materials most widely used for dental implant applications. In the present work, anodic oxide films have been produced on cp‐Ti surfaces by plasma electrolytic oxidation (PEO) technique. After PEO treatments, oxide films with different surface features (e.g. surface roughness, morphology and film thickness) were obtained according with anodising parameters. The tribocorrosion behaviour of untreated and PEO‐treated Ti samples was investigated by reciprocating sliding tests performed in artificial saliva. PEO treatments significantly improved the performance of cp‐Ti substrates when they were submitted simultaneously to electrochemical and mechanical effects, and it was influenced by PEO processing parameters. PEO seems to be a very attractive technique for the development of bio‐tribocorrosion resistant Ti surfaces with potential for biomedical applications namely, for dental implants. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Titanium (Ti) dental implants are frequently exposed simultaneously to a corrosive environment and cyclic micromovements at implant/abutment and implant/ bone interfaces, becoming part of a tribocorrosion system. Thus, wear debris and corrosion products/ions can be released to peri-implant tissues and induce inflammatory reactions leading to implant failure. Moreover, the poor osseointegration is also one of the main problems affecting dental implants lifetime. Surface modification strategies have been proposed to design novel Ti oxide-based multifunctional surfaces that are able to simultaneously improve cellular functions and provide enhanced tribocorrosion resistance. Hence, the main objective of this work was the synthesis of Calcium (Ca)-and Phosphorous (P)-enriched Ti oxide films aimed to display superior wear/corrosion performance and simultaneously, to enhance osteoblast-material interactions. Ca-and P-enriched films were synthesized by plasma electrolytic oxidation (PEO) and their characteristics were assessed by Field emission scanning electron microscopy, profilometry, energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, and water contact angle measurements. PEO-treated samples were subjected to pin-on-disk reciprocating sliding tests in artificial saliva at 37°C. The viability of MG63 cells cultured on PEO-treated samples was investigated by MTT assay, and their adhesion ability by SEM and confocal laser scanning microscopy. The wear/corrosion behavior of Ti was improved after PEO treatments and the electrolyte composition appeared to play a crucial role both on its corrosion tendency and mechanical wear resistance. It is believed that this improvement is related to the higher rutile/anatase ratio exhibited by Ca-and P-enriched surfaces. Osteoblasts were well spread on these surfaces displaying improved viability/proliferation compared to Ti.

This review gives a concise introduction to the state-of-art techniques used for surface texturing, e.g., wet etching, plasma etching, laser surface texturing (LST), 3D printing, etc. In order to fabricate deterministic textures with the desired geometric structures and scales, the innovative texturing technologies are developed and extended. Such texturing technology is an emerging frontier with revolutionary impact in industrial and scientific fields. With the help of the latest fabrication technologies, surface textures are scaling down and more complex deterministic patterns may be fabricated with desired functions, e.g., lotus effect (hydrophobic), gecko feet (adhesive), haptic tactile, etc. The objective of this review is to explore the surface texturing technology and its contributions to the applications.

No abstract

No abstract

Porous scaffolds made of elastomeric materials are of great interest for soft tissue engineering. Poly(L-lactide-co-ε-caprolactone) (PLCL) is a bio-resorbable elastomeric copolymer with tailorable properties, which make this material an appropriate candidate to be used as scaffold for vascular, tendon, and nerve healing applications. Here, extrusion was applied to produce porous scaffolds of PLCL, using NaCl particles as a leachable agent. The effects of the particle proportion and size on leaching performance, dimensional stability, mechanical properties, and ageing of the scaffolds were analyzed. The efficiency of the particle leaching and scaffold swelling when wet were observed to be dependent on the porogenerator proportion, while the secant moduli and ultimate tensile strengths were dependent on the pore size. Porosity, swelling, and mechanical properties of the extruded scaffolds were tailorable, varying with the proportion and size of porogenerator particles and showed similar values to human soft tissues like nerves and veins (E = 7–15 MPa, σu = 7 MPa). Up to 300-mm length micro-porous PLCL tube with 400-µm thickness wall was extruded, proving extrusion as a high-throughput manufacturing process to produce tubular elastomeric bio-resorbable porous scaffolds of unrestricted length with tunable mechanical properties.

No abstract