Hydroxyapatite (HA) is used as a biomaterial for artificial bone owing to its excellent osteoconductivity. The applications of HA are limited, however, because of its mechanical weakness. A composite of titanium and HA, which has a higher mechanical strength, has been developed for dental implants using coating techniques. Plasma spraying is one of the major coating techniques used for this purpose. However, this method may cause fractures occurring in film coatings due to thick coating with more than 40 μm. A radio frequency (RF) sputtering technique is a very attractive method because the coated film is a homogeneous thin film less than 1μm thick, exhibiting a high bonding strength to the substrate. This paper introduces the development of HA sputtered film and its application for the dental implant.
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