The nanotube surface treatment evolved from solar panel research by various groups and biomaterials research by Sungho Jin, PhD at the University of California San Diego (UCSD). Others, including Amit Bandyopadhyay, PhD and collaborating researchers at Washington State University (WSU), Craig Friedrick, PhD, Tolou Shokuhfar, PhD and their team at Michigan Technological University, and Masa Ishigami, PhD’s team at the University of Central Florida (UCF), have helped to enhance the technology. Established companies specializing in medical implant surface treatments have helped to scale and commercialize the technology.

It is hard to imagine just how tiny nanotubes are compared to traditional implant surface structures. They are thousands of times smaller than traditional porous structures on implants or even cells. Millions of nanotubes form a surface texture and energy that attracts and interacts with the outer membrane of a cell wall. These arrays of millions of nanotubes per square millimeter can be formed onto flat or porous structures.

Nanotubes are not an additive coating. They are formed into the existing metal oxide tissue-contacting surface of implants. Titanium, tantalum, and zirconium metals and alloy implants are directly treated with an anodization process to form the nanotubes. Implants made from other materials such as PEEK, medical polymers, ceramics and CoCrMo are indirectly treated by first applying a thin layer of titanium that is then processed by a similar patented anodization technique to form nanotubes on its surface.

Any implant surface that requires stable fixation against bone such as a hip, knee, ankle, shoulder, hand, or spinal implant can be enhanced by nanotubes.