Abstract

GONZALEZ, Leonardo. Structure and fatigue properties of titanium and its alloys used as biomaterials. uct [online]. 2013, vol.17, n.67, pp.92-108. ISSN 1316-4821.

A biomaterial is any material which has been made and designed to interact, properly, with a biological environment, mainly human body. Biomaterials can be classified as: metallic, ceramics and plastics. As a consequence of dynamic and human activities, the most important mechanical property to evaluate is the fatigue resistance, whereas the physicochemical one is corrosion resistance. For this reason, failures in many implants and prostheses at the osteosystem occur by corrosion-fatigue processes. In these issues the metallographic and crystallographic structures play an important role in the behavior of these devices during service. Making, shaping and heat treating processes are also extremely important to acquire such high quality properties, although an additional cost is involved. For the scope of this subject mechanical fatigue strength, corrosion-fatigue strength and structure of titanium and its alloys, used nowadays as biomaterials, will be considered in shortly.

Keywords : Biomaterials; Fatigue; Titanium Alloys; Structure; Phase Transformations; Prostheses; Implants; Osteogeneses and Osteosyntheses; Nitinol.

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