Modification of surface morphology of UHMWPE for biomedical implants

Ultra High Molecular Weight Polyethylene (UHMWPE) samples were implanted with metal and metal-gas hybrid ions (Ag, Ag+N, C+H, C+H+Ar, Ti+O) by using improved MEVVA Ion implantation technique [1,2]. An extraction voltage of 30 kV and influence of 1017 ions/cm2 were attempted in this experiment, to change their surface morphologies in order to understand the effect of ion implantation on the surface properties of UHMWPEs. Characterizations of the implanted samples with RBS , ATR - FTIR, spectra were compared with the un-implanted ones . Implanted and unimplanted samples were also thermally characterized by TGA and DSC. It was generally observed that C-H bond concentration seemed to be decreasing with ion implantation and the results indicated that the chain structure of UHMWPE were changed and crosslink density and polymer crystallinity were increased compared to unimplanted ones resulting in increased hardness. It was also observed that nano size cracks (approx.10nm) were significantly disappeared after Ag implantation, which also has an improved antibacterial effect. Contact angle measurements showed that wettability of samples increased with ion implantation. Results showed that metal and metal+gas hybrid ion implantation could be an effective way to improve the surface properties of UHMWPE to be used in hip and knee prosthesis. © 2007 Materials Research Society.