In vitro corrosion and biocompatibility screening of sputtered Ti40Cu36Pd14Zr10 thin film metallic glasses on steels

• Ti-based TFMG coated specimen showed superior corrosion resistance.
• Ti-based TFMG coated SS 316L specimen was non-cytotoxic in nature.
• Antimicrobial activity of Ti-based TFMG was noticed.

The growth of multi-component thin film metallic glasses (TFMGs) of Ti40Cu36Pd14Zr10 (at.%) alloys fabricated using magnetron sputtering on bioimplantable 316L stainless steel substrates has been investigated. The vapor–solid quenching during sputtering enables the amorphous phases to be formed. The amorphous films consist of a single glassy phase, as evidenced by a broad hump and no detectable crystalline peaks as observed from XRD and selective area electron diffraction (SAED) patterns. The average surface roughness (Ra) of the coated film as observed from AFM was 0.3 nm. Nanohardness of about 7.7 GPa and Young's modulus of 110 GPa were measured from nanoindentation analysis. The potentiodynamic polarization and impedance measurements showed that coated stainless steel substrates have higher corrosion resistance compared to uncoated SS substrate in simulated body fluid (SBF) solution. The cytotoxicity studies using L929 fibroblast cells showed that these coatings were non-cytotoxic in nature. The interactions between the coated surface and bacteria were investigated by agar diffusion method, solution suspension and wet interfacial contact methods.

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