Evaluation of cell activation promoted by tantalum and tantalum oxide coatings deposited by reactive DC magnetron sputtering

In vitro studies showed that cells exhibited significantly better adhesion to Ta, in comparison with both TaO and SS 316L. Furthermore, both Ta and TaO were shown to be non-cytotoxic, with Ta outperforming TaO in terms of relative cell viability, both at 24 h and 48 h. Lastly, both Ta and TaO showed vastly inferior IL-6 and IL-10 levels to those obtained for cells treated with bacterial lipopolysaccharides (LPS)-prompting the conclusion that the coatings do not in any way induce an inflammatory response from macrophage cells.