SUMMARY:
UCLA researchers in the School of Dentistry at the Weintraub Center for Reconstructive Biology have developed a novel titanium implant with hierarchical multi-scale roughness to promote bone growth.
BACKGROUND:
Titanium implants are used as a scaffold to regenerate bone. Degeneration and injury of bone, joints, and jaw are on a rapid increase in the aging population. Implants made of titanium or titanium alloy are used to repair, immobilize, stabilize, restore, and reconstruct these unhealthy, diseased, and defect areas. Titanium implants serve to maintain and secure space for bone regeneration and to immobilize graft materials for spine and other areas of bone, artificial joints and stems for knee and hip areas, and dental implants in jaw and maxillofacial areas. Implant treatment faces many challenges including: protracted healing time, failure, revision surgery, surgical complications including infection, and insufficient mechanical tolerance and anchorage of implants. These problems are directly related to the limited biological capability of titanium plates to regenerate bone which often limits their utility in the clinic. Macroscopic design and micro-scale machining efforts have been used to promote bone-implant integration, however further optimization and design is necessary to address these problems and challenges.
INNOVATION:
UCLA researchers led by Dr. Takahiro Ogawa have developed new titanium implants optimized for bone regeneration. These new implants have optimized hierarchical surface properties generated by multi-scale (meso, micro, and nano) machining to promote bone growth. These implants with hierarchical roughness and design have demonstrated greater strength of bone-implant integration than titanium implants with micro-scale roughness alone. Titanium implants with this new design may address limitations and problems associated with current implant technologies.
APPLICATIONS:
- Implants for bone degeneration and bone-related injuries
- Dental implants
ADVANTAGES:
- Promotes improved bone growth compared to current standard titanium implant technology
- May increase efficacy of procedure and allow for faster recovery rates
- Generates stronger, more normal bone
STAGE OF DEVELOPMENT:
Prototypes of the device have been tested in bone regeneration assays.
PATENT STATUS :
Patent Pending
Tech ID: 30585 / UC Case 2017-529-0