Co-Deposition and Characterization of Hydroxyapatite-Chitosan and Hydroxyapatite-Polyvinylacetate Coatings on 304 SS for Biomedical Devices

Abstract

During the last decades, biomaterials have been deeply studied to perform and improve coatings for biomedical devices. Metallic materials, especially in the orthopedic field, represent the most common material used for different type of devices thanks to their good mechanical properties. Nevertheless, low/medium resistance to corrosion and low osteointegration ability characterizes these materials. To overcome these problems, the use of biocoatings on metals substrate is largely diffused. In fact, biocoatings have a key role to confer biocompatibility properties, to inhibit corrosion and thus improve the lifetime of implanted devices. In this work, the attention was focused on Hydroxyapatite-Chitosan (HA/CS) and Hydroxyapatite-Polyvinylacetate (HA/PVAc) composites, that have been studied as biocoatings for 304 SS based devices. Hydroxyapatite was selected for its osteoconductivity thanks to its chemical structure similar to bones. Furthermore, Chitosan and Polyvinylacetate are largely used yet in medical field (e.g. antibacterial agent or drug deliver) and in this work were used to create a synergic interaction with hydroxyapatite to increase the strength and bioactivity of coating. Biocotings were obtained by galvanic deposition process that does not require an external power supply. It is a spontaneous electrochemical deposition in which materials with different standard electrochemical potential were short-circuited and immersed in an electrolytic solution. Electrons supply for the cathodic reaction in the noblest material comes from oxidation of the less noble material. SEM, EDS, XRD and RAMAN were performed for chemical-physics characterization of biocoatings. Polarization and impedance measurements have been carried out to evaluate corrosion behavior. Besides, in-vitro cytotoxicity assays have been done for the biological features.