When it comes to dental implants, titanium comes up as the top material of choice. The reason being that it has an inert surface making it biocompatible, therefore it won’t trigger any bad reactions from the immune system.
However, its strength is its weakness. The metal does not initiate any new blood vessel or bone growth around the implant. Researchers have decided to coat the metal with a material called “Bonelike”. It’s a synthetic bone material, hydroxyapatite reinforced with tiny glass particles.
In order to check whether it had any reaction with the blood vessels and bone around the implant, researchers coated 27 titanium implants with the said material. After a few months, the results are in: “The Bonelike-coated dental implants proved to be highly bioactive with extensive new bone formation and attachment,” the researchers say.
Hoping we’ll see more of this in the future.