Biomedical response of tantalum oxide films deposited by DC reactive unbalanced magnetron sputtering

Tantalum oxide (Ta-O) films have been widely used as dielectric, optoelectronics and high temperature resistance materials. But the biological response of the Ta-O films is rarely studied. In this paper, the biomedical properties of Ta-O films were studied. Tantalum oxide films were deposited on Si(100) and glass substrate at different oxygen-to-argon ratios by DC reactive unbalanced magnetron sputtering. The structure, blood compatibility, surface energy and semiconductor properties were studied. The results showed that the Ta-O films were amorphous and its optical band-gap increased from 3.65 eV to 3.95 eV with increasing oxygen pressure. The surface energy of Ta-O films were about 40-46 mJ/m2. The low surface energy, and low dispersive energy were the reasons of their better blood compatibility. There were less platelet adhered and aggregated at the Ta-O film which deposited at O2/Ar ratio 0.4, and it had better antithrombotic properties.