EVOLUTION OF THE BONE-TITANIUM INTERFACE ON IMPLANTS COATED NONCOATEDWITH XENOGENEIC BONE PARTICLES - QUANTITATIVE MICROSCOPIC ANALYSIS/

Titanium cylinders having a sandblasted surface were implanted in hole s drilled in the internal condyles of rabbit femurs. The right side re ceived a titanium implant coated with xenogeneic bone particles and th e left side received a titanium cylinder alone and was used as control . The femoral extremities were removed at 1, 2, and 3 months postsurge ry and embedded undecalcified in methacrylic resins. Sections were stu died by quantitative analysis and the interface contact between bone a nd titanium was measured at two microscopic magnifications due to the fractal dimension of this parameter. In addition the amount of bone vo lume in a given referent volume provided automatically by the image an alyzer was obtained. No differences could be evidenced between the two series of implants, supporting the view that xenogeneic particles wer e ineffective in improving the attachment of bone to the implant. The bone-to-implant interface measured at the low magnification reflected the anchorage of the implant. In both series a progressive increase up on time of the bone-to-implant interface at the highest microscopic ma gnification evidenced the importance of late remodeling changes respon sible for bone bonding and the fractal characteristics of this interfa ce, related to surface quality of the implant responsible for stress t ransfer. (C) 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.