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Comparison of low-pressure oxygen plasma and chemical treatments for surface modifications of Ti6Al4V

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Abstract

Different treatments were conducted over Ti6Al4V samples in order to produce a surface modification to increase cell attachment and proliferation. The surface treatments evaluated in this study were as follows: etching with sulfuric acid/hydrochloric acid, oxidizing with hydrogen peroxide and low-pressure oxygen plasma treatment. In contrast to other works found in the literature, this research conducts a comparison between different chemical and physical treatments in terms of different assays for surface characterization: X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscope (SEM), energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, water contact angle, release of vanadium ions and cell viability tests (MTT) of human osteoblasts (hFOB 1.19). Cell morphology over the different substrates was also studied by SEM observation. It was found that plasma and peroxide treatments increase the O/Ti ratio at the titanium surface and provide an increase in cell affinity. On the other hand, acid etching provides a superhydrophilic surface which is not able to improve the cell attachment of human osteoblasts.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge the support of the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO), funding the SUPPORT project (DPI2015-71073-R) and the UNLP10-3E-726 Infrastructure Project (2010), co-financed with ERDF funds. M.E. Alemán would like to express her gratitude for the funding through the Ph.D. Grant Program of ULPGC (code of the Grant: PIFULPGC-2014-ING-ARQU-2) and the BAMOS project (H2020-MSCA-RISE-734156, funded from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program) for providing funding for mobility.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departamento de Ingeniería de Procesos, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Campus universitario de Tafira Baja, 35017, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain

    María Elena Alemán-Domínguez, Zaida Ortega & Antonio N. Benítez

  2. Departamento de Ingeniería Mecánica, Universidad de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Campus universitario de Tafira Baja, 35017, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain

    Aday Romero-Pérez & Ruymán Santana-Farré

  3. State Key Laboratory for Manufacturing System Engineering, School of Mechanical Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Science and Technology Park of Xi’an Jiaotong University, Yanta District, Xi’an City, 710054, Shaanxi Province, People’s Republic of China

    Ling Wang

  4. Research Unit, Dr. Negrín University Hospital, 35019, Las Palmas, Canary Islands, Spain

    Francisco Rodríguez-Esparragón

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  1. María Elena Alemán-Domínguez
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  2. Zaida Ortega
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Correspondence to Zaida Ortega.

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Alemán-Domínguez, M.E., Ortega, Z., Benítez, A.N. et al. Comparison of low-pressure oxygen plasma and chemical treatments for surface modifications of Ti6Al4V. Bio-des. Manuf. 2, 65–75 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42242-019-00036-9

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