Applied Surface Science, Vol.478, 806-817, 2019
Hierarchical surface morphology on Ti6Al4V via patterning and hydrothermal treatment towards improving cellular response
Titanium implants are widely used in load bearing applications. Failure analysis for several decades revealed poor interfacial bonding at implant-tissue interface is the major cause. Diverse morphological and chemical modifications are carried out to overcome to this issue. In this study, we developed a simple, user friendly combinatorial approach of embossing followed by hydrothermal treatment for generating nano/micro/macro hierarchical architecture on Ti6Al4V surface with deposition of calcium phosphate minerals for improving osseointegration property. The hydrothermally treated groove/pillar patterned sample had uniformly distributed nanorods with 65 +/- 3 nm diameter, surface roughness similar to 118 nm and similar to 532 nm height, respectively. Presence of phosphate and calcium were confirmed through EDS and XRD with Ca/P ratio similar to 1.66 which is similar to apatite like deposition. Calcium phosphate apatite formation was also confirmed on the surface by XPS. The hydrothermal treated samples demonstrated improved hMSC cell adhesion, migration, proliferation and differentiation as compared to untreated ones. Therefore, this method has potential to minimize interfacial failure through morphological fixation via tissue ingrowth as well as ongrowth.