Electrochemical synthesis, corrosion behavior and cytocompatibility of Ni-Ti-O nanopores on NiTi alloy

In the present work, we report the anodic growth of Ni-Ti-O nanopores (NPs) on NiTi alloy in ethylene glycol (EG) electrolyte containing H2O and NaBr. It is shown that the NPs with diameter concentrated at 50-60 nm can be grown at 10 V in EG electrolyte containing 5 vol% H2O and 0.48 M NaBr. The NP-coated NiTi alloy show lower corrosion current density compared with that of the bare NiTi alloy. In addition, the NPs possess good cytocompatibility and can even promote osteoblast spreading. Good corrosion resistance and cytocompatibility render the Ni-Ti-O NPs promising as coating of the NiTi alloy for biomedical applications.