KEYWORDS

Biotribology, Fluid Mechanics Methods, EHL (General)

THE INFLUENCE OF TEXTURED SURFACES ON THE TRIBOLOGICAL BEHAVIOUR OF HIP REPLACEMENTS

The tribological behaviour of Metal-on-Metal (MoM) hip prostheses is a key factor for their success. In particular, wear is recognized to have a crucial role in the failure of a prosthesis and can have severe consequences on the patient's health, e.g. pseudo-tumors in MoM implants. The lubrication of the coupling between the prosthetic head and the acetabular cup can affect both the contact behaviour and the wear of the prosthesis. Different contributions exist in the pertinent literature addressing the elastohydrodynamic analysis of the head-acetabulum coupling, but rarely these analysis are performed taking into account the possible fluid cavitation in the contact area between the mating surfaces. In order to improve the tribological performance of hip implants, the use of textured surfaces has been proposed in recent studies. The present contribution focuses on the possible improvement that textured surfaces could give to the hip joint replacement tribological behaviour.

Authors and Institutions

Daniele Dini, Imperial College, London, UK, Matteo Giacopini, Antonio Giuseppe Mulas and Enrico Bertocchi, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy