Novel Ti-base superelastic alloys with large recovery strain and excellent biocompatibility.

In this study, a new Ti-Zr-Nb-Sn alloy system was developed as Ni-free biomedical superelastic alloys with a large recovery strain and excellent biocompatibility. Ti-18Zr-(9-16)Nb-(0-4)Sn alloys were prepared by an Ar arc melting method and the effect of composition on the crystal structure and superelastic properties was investigated. A large superelastic recovery strain of 6.0% was observed in Ti-18Zr-12.5Nb-2Sn, Ti-18Zr-11Nb-3Sn, and Ti-18Zr-9.5Nb-4Sn alloys subjected to cold-rolling and solution treatment. XRD results showed that the large recovery strain of Sn-added alloys is due to a combination effect of a large transformation strain and a strong recrystallization texture. The Ti-18Zr-11Nb-3Sn alloy exhibited excellent cyclic stability with an extremely narrow stress hysteresis about 20MPa. Cytocompatibility was also examined using three types of cell lines, murine fibroblast L929, human osteosarcoma SaOS-2, and human umbilical vein endothelial cell HUVEC and the results showed that the Ti-18Zr-11Nb-3Sn alloy exhibited larger cell covering ratios when compared with those of the Ti-50.5Ni alloy for all kinds of cells.