Investigation on surface properties of lasertextured Ti-6Al-4V ELI biomaterial

Abstract In this paper, a thorough analysis of nanosecond laser texturing on Ti-6A1-4V ELI material was carried out, with a particular emphasis on the modulation of laser process parameters and their effects on surface morphology, elemental composition, microscale topographical features, and wettability. The laser-textured samples exhibit unique surface morphologies that were identified by different topographical metrics such as average surface roughness (Sa), surface development ratio (Sdr), peak-to-peak distance (dp), and peak-to-valley height (hp) along parallel and perpendicular to laser scanning directions. The energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy (EDS) was used to examine the differences in elemental composition and crystallographic constitution of the samples revealed using the x-ray diffraction analysis (XRD). Further contact angle measurement in both the parallel and perpendicular directions revealed the hydrophobicity of the laser-textured surfaces. Out of 4 samples, LT-2 and LT-4 samples displayed noticeably larger contact angles, demonstrating a high degree of hydrophobicity in both directions. Improved hydrophobicity of the textured surfaces may lead to reduced bacterial attachment, whereas anisotropic surface features at the microscale may provide contact guidance to osteoblast cells, opening up avenues for regenerative tissue engineering on biomaterial interfaces.