Tribological Behavior of Nanocomposites Based on UHMWPE Aged in Simulated Synovial Fluid

Annamaria Visco; Samy Yousef; Cristina Scolaro; Claudia Espro; Mariateresa Cristani

doi:10.3390/polym10111291

Tribological Behavior of Nanocomposites Based on UHMWPE Aged in Simulated Synovial Fluid

Polymers (Basel). 2018 Nov 21;10(11):1291. doi: 10.3390/polym10111291.

Authors

Annamaria Visco^{1

2}, Samy Yousef^{3

4}, Cristina Scolaro⁵, Claudia Espro⁶, Mariateresa Cristani⁷

Affiliations

¹ Department of Engineering, University of Messina, C.da Di Dio, 98166 Messina, Italy. avisco@unime.it.
² Institute for Chemical-Physical Processes CNR-IPCF, Viale Ferdinando Stagno d'Alcontres, 37, 98158 Messina, Italy. avisco@unime.it.
³ Department of Production Engineering and Printing Technology, Akhbar Elyom Academy 6th of October, Giza 12511, Egypt. ahmed.saed@ktu.lt.
⁴ Department of Production Engineering, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering and Design, Kaunas University of Technology, 51424 Kaunas, Lithuania. ahmed.saed@ktu.lt.
⁵ Department of Engineering, University of Messina, C.da Di Dio, 98166 Messina, Italy. cscolaro@unime.it.
⁶ Department of Engineering, University of Messina, C.da Di Dio, 98166 Messina, Italy. espro@unime.it.
⁷ Department of Chemical, Biological, Pharmaceutical and Environmental Sciences, V. Annunziata, 98168 Messina, Italy. mcristani@unime.it.

Abstract

Ultra High molecular weight polyethylene (UHMWPE) suffers wear degradation in total joint replacements and it needs to be improved. Thus, we enhanced wear resistance of UHMWPE with carbon nanofiller and paraffin oil and studied its tribological behavior in Simulated Synovial Fluid (SSF) for 60 days at 37 °C to reproduce the conditions of a real joint. Ageing in biological fluid accelerates the wear action but nanocomposite exhibited a higher wear resistance compared to UHMWPE because of its higher structural homogeneity. Carbon nanofiller closes the porosity of UHMWPE hindering SSF to penetrate inside. Wear resistance of the nanocomposite with 1.0 wt.% of CNF improved of 65% (before ageing) and of 70% (after 60 days in SSF) with respect to pure UHMWPE.

Keywords: UHMWPE; ageing; nanocomposites; tribological behavior.