Surface improvement of metal implants: New preparation methods and new materials

(gefördert durch: EU Commission)

Projektpartner

• Univertsité Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg, France
• Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel
• DENTARUM, Ispringen, Germany
• University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy
• PAROGENE, Strasbourg, France
• Ytremiska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden

Projektinhalt

To improve both aspects one has to accelerate the osteointegration process and to initiate and control the formation of functional conjunctive tissue attachments. Titanium (Ti) surfaces coated by hydroxyapatite (HA) crystals deposited by a Torch Plasma process have been developed to address point. The poor adhesion of the crystals on the surface, however, strongly affects the life span of the implant. A new deposition process, the Pulsed Laser Deposition, has thus been proposed recently to improve the stability of the titanium/crystal interface. To improve the conjunctive attachments, the roughness of the titanium surface has been modified but no clear conclusions emerge up to now.

The goal of this project is to develop new surface treatments of titanium implants able to trigger and to control cell differentiation with the ability for different biological functions to be fulfilled simultaneously in different loci of the implant. Two complementary ways are proposed to reach these goals:

1. A totally new approach based on a multilayer polyelectrolyte titanium surface coating allowing easy targeted fictionalisation.
2. Improvement of Pulsed Laser Deposited coatings by using specifically designed highly bioactive calcium phosphate crystals and realization of architecturally coated implants.

These surface treatments have also to be evaluated with respect to cell adhesion and differentiation and new standard tests will thus be developed.