Improvement of osseointegration of Ti and Ti-alloys by hydrothermally prepared bioactive anatase coating

Copyright © 2015 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd. This paper reports on the in vivo behaviour of Ti6Al4V alloy substrates with or without a porous Ti layer that were coated with a thin layer of anatase TiO2 by a hydrothermal treatment. In vivo tests were performed on TiO2 coating with certain morphology, i.e. pinacoidal anatase, which was proven in our previous studies to have better bioactive characteristics then other anatase morphology. A pronounced effect of the hydrothermally prepared TiO2 coating was seen with the in vivo test where Ti6Al4V implants with a porous Ti layer on the surface were implanted in rabbit tibia for ten weeks. There was a large increase in the amount of mineralised bone within the porous Ti layer when the implant was coated with anatase TiO2.