Physical, electrochemical, and biocompatibility characteristics of Ti-Al-N thin film synthesized by DC pulsed magnetron sputtering

Owing to the desired mechanical and biomedical characteristics of TiN-based coatings and the encourage features of pulsed magnetron sputtering, the current study was conducted to deposit Ti-Al-N thin film on AISI 316 using DC pulsed magnetron sputtering. All processing parameters were constant excluding the pulsed magnetron power which was varied from 100 to 175 W. The effect of processing power on the structure, mechanical, electrochemical, and biocompatibility characteristics of Ti-Al-N thin films were inspected. X-ray outlines the formation of (Ti, Al)N solid solution with (111) preferred orientation at high-pulsed magnetron powers. The outcomes of this study demonstrated that the Vickers’s microhardness of Ti-Al-N coatings increased with increasing pulsed power to record a value of nearly 810 HV0.015 at 175 W. Moreover, the wear characteristics and the friction coefficient of the coated AISI 316 with Ti-Al-N were ascendant as compared with the uncoated substrate. The wear rate of Ti-Al-N films deposited at pulsed power of 175 W recorded a value of nearly 4.7 × 10−6 mm3/Nm which was very low compared with that of stainless steel substrate (3.2 × 10−4 mm3/Nm). The biological peculiarities of Ti-Al-N films were examined by exploring the proliferation rate of MC3T3-E1 osteoblast cells on the film surface. The results reflected that the proliferation rate of the osteoblast cells were enhanced on Ti-Al-N films deposited at pulsed powers of 150 and 175 W. The biological attitudes were discussed according to the results of surface roughness and surface energy besides the surface chemical compositions.