Osseointegration of sputtered SiC-added hydroxyapatite for orthopaedic applications

Over the last few years, a trend in medical applications is to find solutions for metallic implants using coatings that can improve bioactivity and osseointegration. The goal of this study was to obtain and investigate sputtered hydroxyapatite coatings enriched with SiC to enhance the bioactivity and osseointegration of Ti alloys used in orthopaedic applications. The films were characterized in terms of phase composition, roughness, corrosion resistance in a synthetic body fluid (SBF) and in vitro biocompatibility with MG 63 osteoblast-like cells. All of the investigations were conducted using XRD, AFM, cell viability assays and proliferation tests. The results revealed that the addition of SiC had a positive influence on the properties of the sputtered hydroxyapatite. The addition of SiC led to an improvement in coating adhesion and corrosion resistance in an SBF solution over the HAP coating. All of the coatings presented cell viability values over 90%, revealing their suitability for medical applications.