Experimental research on porous titanium implant fabricated by three-dimensional printing with different sintering temperatures / 国际生物医学工程杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective The aim of this study was to evaluate the feasibility of three-dimensional printing (3DP) for the preparation of porous titanium implant and to investigate the impacts on microstructure and mechanical properties with different sintering temperatures.Methods The CAD model of the specimens was designed to be 25 mm in diameter,20 mm in height,and with 0.5 mm pore size mesh.On every cross-section,80％ bonding area was designed.Titanium powder (purity of 98.5％,75 μm diameter) was selected as raw material.Polyvinyl alcohol powder (160 μm diameter) was selected as a binder,and polyvinylpyrrolidone powder was selected as an auxiliary binder.The green porous titanium implants were fabricated by 3DP followed by sintering at 1 200,1 300,1 400 ℃,separately,under the protection of argon gas.After sintering,the properties of porous titanium implants were evaluated,including the porosity,microstructure,microhardness,compressive strength and elastic modulus.Results After sintering,the specimen had uniform contraction and no obvious distortion.The specimen sintered at 1 200,1 300 and 1 400 ℃ sintering temperatures had porosity of (65.01±1.03)％,(46.73±0.73)％ and (41.06±0.31)％,hardness of 115.2±0.6,148.6±1.1 and 182.8±2.1,elastic modulus of (5.9±0.5),(16.2±0.9) and (34.8±1.5) GPa,compressive strength of (81.3±4.3),(135.4±8.5) and (218.6±7.1) MPa,respectively.A porous structure with three-dimensional network of connected pores was observed under scanning electron microscope.Conclusion It is feasible to fabricate porous titanium implants by three dimensional printing technique.The mechanical properties of the porous titanium implants match well with bone tissue which has excellent biomechanical compatibility.