Sirikul Wisutmethangoon, Prathumrat Nu-Young, Lek Sikong, and Thawatchai Plookphol

pp. 509 - 513

Abstract

Porous titanium with good strength and three-dimension pore structure was fabricated by using TiH₂ as vesicant foaming titanium powder. This kind of porous titanium with good bio-mechanical compatibility may have the potential to alleviate the problems caused by the mismatch of the strength and Young’s modulus between implant (110 GPa for titanium) and bone. Moreover, the pores (mainly in 100-700 µm) are all interconnected. This porous structure would endow the materials with better activity between bone and porous implant matrix. Furthermore, biocompatible porous titanium with a porosity of 33.51-49.09 vol.%, a compressive strength of 156.19-173.34 MPa and a hardness of 438.51-461.40 is known to be a good candidate material for use as bone implants. In the present study, porous titanium was fabricated by using a powder metallurgical process. The effects of process variables, such as the size of the foaming agent and the sintering
temperature, on the pore structure and the mechanical properties were investigated. The relationships between the pore structure and the mechanical properties were also studied.