Medical

Overview

Contamination of walls, floors and surfaces of many articles that we use in day-to-day life is the main reason for disease to spread rapidly. Hence, ensuring that these surfaces are free of microbial contamination, especially in hospitals, is an important factor in maintaining the general health of people. Silver in the form of metallic silver or silver salts is known to be toxic to micro-organism, particularly bacteria while being relatively harmless to a man. When nano scaled silver is introduced to a hybrid sol-gel matrix, it results in an antimicrobial coating due to the silver nanoparticles and scratch resistant due to the inorganic network of sol-gel coatings providing high degree of abrasion resistance too. This helps in retarding the growth of microbes and thus minimizes the use of autoclaving process or cleaning using harsh chemicals. Other functionalities such as easy-to-clean property can also be incorporated into the coatings.

Key Features

• Incorporation of anti-microbial nanoparticles, controlled release mechanism 
• Easy-to-clean coatings have surface properties comparable to perfluorinated polymers (hydrophobic surface) 
• Non-toxic 
• Easy to scale up for large area coatings

Potential Applications

• Medicine bottles/containers
• Hospital wall panels, hospital furniture
• Hearing aids
• Food packaging
• Textile walls and textile roofs, sun shades, blinds
• As top coats on wall paints
• Anti-fouling coatings on marine floating objects

Intellectual Property Development Indices (IPDI)

• Performance and stability validated at laboratory scale

Anti-microbial coating applied on carpet

No growth of ecoli on & undermeath the fabric and indefinite growth in broth

Major Patents / Publications

Major Patents

Overview

Titanium and its alloys are the most commonly used materials for dental implants. Although the biological performance of these alloys are extremely good, there are potential immunologic and aesthetic issues with titanium implants. The material currently explored to replace titanium alloys is yttria-stabilized zirconia (YSZ) due to its tooth-like colour, hardness, toughness, corrosion resistance and osseointegration. However, the lack of long-term stability of YSZ in presence of body fluid is a major disadvantage. To achieve the benefits of each of these materials and nullify their drawbacks, functionally graded materials (FGM) of Ti-alloy/zirconia, was developed using the spark plasma sintering (SPS) process. Their physical and mechanical properties, microstructure analysis and in-vitro biocompatibility tests were carried out and compared with existing commercial implants. The Ti-alloy/zirconia bi-layered component yielded excellent mechanical properties like strength, hardness and in-vitro biological properties like cytotoxicity, hemolysis and cell proliferation at par with those of commercially available dental implants.

Key Features

• A simple PM process to fabricate metal-ceramic FGMs in one step was explored for the first time
• High density, good hardness, strength and excellent biological properties were achieved in the Ti-alloy/zirconia components.
• The concept of developing new dental implant from existing MRI compatible materials could be demonstrated

Potential Applications

• Dental implants

Technology Readiness Level (TRL) :

• Processing and properties are validated at laboratory scale
• Coupon level demonstrated

Intellectual Property Development Indices (IPDI)

• Basic concepts and understanding of underlying scientific principles
• Short listing possible applications
• Research to prove technical feasibility for targeted application

Fig. (a) Schematic of taper die used for fabricating bilayered components, (b) a typical bilayered implant having YSZ as crown and Ti6Al4V as fixture

Major Patents / Publications

Major Patents

• 1. R. Jayasree , K. Raghava, M. Sadhasivam, P.V.V. Srinivas, R. Vijay, K.G. Pradeep, T.N. Rao, D. Chakravarty, “Bilayered metal-ceramic components for dental implants by spark plasma sintering,” Mater. Lett. 344, 134403, 2023.
• Bilayered dental implants and process for the preparation thereof, patent application no. 202341014475 dated 03-03-2023.

Major Publications

Overview

Masks are playing a major role as personal protective equipment needed to fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. Ag-Cu/CuO nanoparticles have been coated on fabrics by two different processes including nano-suspension coatings using nanopowders synthesized by Flame spray pyrolysis (FSP) and electroless coating process. Prototype masks are prepared for demonstration as shown in figure 1(a). Very uniform coatings have been achieved on the fabric by both processes (Figure 1 (b)). The nanoparticles coated fabrics are tested for their antibacterial efficacy using ASTM E2315 (99.7% disinfection of bacteria in 30 seconds) as shown in Figure (c) and anti-viral (SARS CoV-2) efficacy. The nanoparticles coated fabrics are found to exhibit anti-bacterial properties even after 30 washes and anti-viral properties showed more than 75% efficacy compared to uncoated fabric.

Key Features

• Scalable process
• Antibacterial efficacy : 99.7 % in 30 sec
• Anti-viral (SARS CoV-2 efficacy : ) > 75% compared to uncoated fabric
• Cost effective

Potential Applications

• Self-disinfection mask
• Personal protective equipment (PPE)
• Hospital textiles

Technology Readiness Level (TRL)

• Scale-up to pilot scale
• Validated for antibacterial and antiviral efficacy

Intellectual Property Development Indices (IPDI)

Figure 1: (a) Prototype masks showing nanoparticle coated fabric, (b) (b) FESEM images of nanoparticle coated fabrics and (c) Antibacterial testing of nanoparticle coated fabrics using ASTM E2315 (d) anti-viral efficacy of nanocoated fabric.

Major Patents / Publications

Major Patents

Major Publications

Overview

Hydroxyapatite (HAP) is a biocompatible ceramic widely used in medicines for many diseases, drug delivery, coating on implants, etc., due to its chemical composition comparable to that of teeth and bone. Nano-HAP nanopowders are advantageous over the micron sized powders due to high surface area. ARCI has developed scalable technology for the production of Hydroxyapatite (HAP) and β-Tricalcium Phosphate nanopowders for biomedical, pharma/nutraceutical applications. The powder production is demonstrated up to kilogram level on pilot scale using Flame Spray Pyrolysis (FSP) unit

Key Features

• Scalable Process
• Average particle size of 23 nm
• High purity
• Medical grade
• HAP and Beta-TCP mixture could be prepared

Potential Applications

• Bone tissue engineering
• Bone void fillers, Orthopedic and dental implant coating
• Desensitizing agent in post teeth bleaching
• Remineralizing agent in toothpastes
• Early carious lesions treatment
• Drug and gene delivery

Technology Readiness Level (TRL):

• Processing and properties are validated at laboratory scale
• Coupon level demonstrated
• Scaled up technology available

Intellectual Property Development Indices (IPDI)

• Basic concepts and understanding of underlying scientific principles
• Short listing possible applications
• Research to prove technical feasibility for targeted application
• Coupon level testing in stimulated conditions

(a) SEM (b) powders size distribution (c) TEM and (d) Phase purity confirmation of HAP nanopowders made by FSP

Major Patents / Publications

Major Patents

Major Publications

Overview

Key Features

• Destroys ≥ 99.2% against SARS-CoV-2 (CCMB), Destroys ≥ 99.997% H1N1 (BUREAU VERITAS)
• Kills ≥ 99.9% gram positive and negative bacteria (NABL Accredited Laboratory)
• Bacterial Filtration Efficiency: ≥ 99.7%
• Particulate Filtration Efficiency at 0.3 µm: ≥ 99.3
• Breathability: 61.2 Pa/cm2
• Splash resistance and water repellent and Classified as class 1 in flammability test
• Safe and harmless to skin and body (in-vivo test by SITRA)
• Reusable > 20 washes and Leaching of particles: allowed limit

Potential Applications

• Self-disinfection mask
• Medical suits
• Medical textiles and sports textiles
• Wound healing

Technology Readiness Level (TRL):

• Processing and properties are validated at pilot scale
• Pilot level demonstrated
• Scaled up technology available

Intellectual Property Development Indices (IPDI)

• Basic concepts and understanding of underlying scientific principles
• Short listing possible applications
• Research to prove technical feasibility for targeted application
• Coupon level testing instimulated conditions
• Check repeatability/ consistency at coupon level
• Prototype testing in real-life conditions
• Check repeatability/ consistency at prototype level
• Reassessing feasibility (IP, competition technology, commercial)

(a)TEM image of the CuO-Ag nanopowders, (b) FE-SEM image of nanoparticle coated fabric, (c) Mask fabric exhibiting an efficacy >99.9% against SARS-CoV-2 and bacteria and (d) Large scale demonstration of the self-disinfecting masks

Major Patents / Publications

Major Patents

• K. Hembram, P. Haripriya, N. Sneha , B. V. Sarada, H.H.Krishnan and T.N. Rao, Synthesis of ceramic-metal nanocomposites for developing self-disinfecting fabrics against SARS-CoV-2 (under review)

Major Publications

Overview

Key Features

• Temporary implant; Elimination of secondary surgery
• Avoid stress-shielding and thrombosis
• Excellent mechanical properties and degradation rate
• Non-cytotoxic to HOS cells

Potential Applications

• Implant Materials for Bone Surgery: Plates, Screws, Pins, etc.
• Stents: Vascular, Coronary, Ureteral, Prostatic, Pancreatic and Biliary, Colon etc.
• Tissue Engineering : Hard and Soft Tissue Anchors /Scaffold

Technology Readiness Level (TRL):

• Processing and properties are validated at laboratory scale
• Coupon level demonstrated

Intellectual Property Development Indices (IPDI)

• Basic concepts and understanding of underlying scientific principles
• Short listing possible applications
• Research to prove technical feasibility for targeted application
• Coupon level testing in stimulated conditions

Properties and Prototype of Fe-Mn based BD alloys

(a) Microstructure, (b) XRD, (c)Tensile properties and (d) PD to determine degradation rate of the Mg-based alloys

Major Patents / Publications

Major Patents

• Improved Method of Preparation for Biodegradable Mg-Zn-Zr Alloys with Superior Degradation, Biocompatible and Mechanical Properties (A patent to be filed).
• D. Spandana, Hemin Desai, D. Chakravarthy, R.Vijay and K. Hembram, Fabrication of a Biodegradable Fe-Mn-Si Alloy by Field Assisted Sintering, Advanced Powder Technology, 31, 12, 4577-4584, 2020

Major Publications