Lubrication effect of polyvinyl alcohol/polyethylene glycol gel for artificial joints

Abstract

One of the most common problems encountered by patients using artificial joints is the high wear rate. In this study, a polyvinyl alcohol/polyethylene glycol (PVA/PEG) gel was prepared through the cross-linking reaction between polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) and polyethylene glycol (PEG) solutions. This gel can lubricate artificial joints, thereby lowering their coefficient of friction (COF) and increasing their service life. Various techniques, such as Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, Raman spectra, X-ray photon spectroscopy, and thermogravimetric analyses, were used to analyze the structure of this synthetic gel. The tribological results indicated that the synthetic gel's lubrication effect was the most optimum when it contained PVA (10 wt%) and PEG (15 wt%). An average COF of 0.05 was obtained under a load of 10 N and at a speed of 1.0 cm/s. In addition, the wear rate was reduced in comparison to distilled water. Furthermore, the biological tests proved that the PVA/PEG gel was highly biocompatible. Thus, this study introduces a novel technique to prepare PVA/PEG gels that improve the tribological performance of artificial joints.