Radiation Enhanced Porosity and Roughness of Materials

Glassy Polymeric Carbon (GPC), made from cured phenolic resins, is sufhciently chemically inert and biocompatlble that it is suitable for medical applications, such as heart valves and other prosthetic devices. We have used energetic ion bombardment of the partially and fully cured precursor phenolic resins to enhance biological cell/tissue growth on, and to increase tissue adhesion to, prosthetic devices made from GPC. GPC samples were bombarded with energetic ions to 10 MeV. The surf&e topography and increased su&ce roughness was observed using optical microscopy and atomic force microscopy @FM). The increased porosity was measured by introducing lithium from a molten LiCl salt into the GPC and using (p, a) nuclear reaction analysis (NRA) to measure the concentration of Li retention in the modified GPC. The NRA measurements of increased pore availability were correlated with the observations of increased surface roughness.