Antibacterial properties of vacuum plasma sprayed titanium coatings after chemical treatment

Implant-related infection is one of the common clinical complications that cause high rates of mortality and morbidity in orthopedic surgery. Endowing implant antibacterial properties is a useful method to reduce such infection. In this paper, vacuum plasma sprayed titanium coatings were treated by NaOH solution firstly, and then antimicrobial silver was introduced into the coatings by immersing in 0.02 mM (denoted as CA1), 0.06 mM (denoted as CA2) and 0.1 mM (denoted as CA3) Ag+ containing calcification solution. Antibacterial property of the treated titanium coatings was examined by employing three types of bacteria stains, Escherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Staphylococcus aureus. X-Ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy were used to observe the phase composition and surface morphology of the modified titanium coatings. Results showed that all of the three kinds of coatings exhibited more than 90.00% antibacterial ratio except CA1 to Staphylococcus aureus which is 63.30%. The release of silver in physiological environment was monitored and it was found that the excellent antibacterial property of the treated coatings was attributed to the release of silver.