On the description of the fractal nature of microstructured surfaces of titanium implants

The determination of the fractal dimension is an interesting way for the characterization of rough surfaces. Microstructured titanium surfaces produced by different technologies (polishing, glass and corundum blasting, vacuum plasma spraying) were investigated by a number of physical and electrochemical methods, i.e. surface profiling, scanning electron microscopy, voltammetry and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. The data sets obtained by these very different methods were used for the estimation of the fractal dimension of all structures. The aim of this work is to examine the suitability of this additional parameter for a better characterization of structured surfaces and to compare the various applied methods regarding their feasibility. Accompanying cell biological examinations were used to verify whether there is a relation between the parameter fractal dimension and cell behaviour.