COMPARISON OF MECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF THE IMPLANT MATERIALS- TITANIUM, ZIRCONIUM AND PEEK USING THREE DIMENSIONAL FINITE ELEMENT ANALYSIS

Background And Objective:Dental implants have been universally accepted as the best option for prosthetic rehabilitation of missing teeth.A material of choice for manufacturing dental implants was for long time commercially pure titanium due to its excellent bio compatibility and mechanical properties. Zirconia seems to be a suitable alternative dental implant material because of its tooth like color and biocompatibility. The most promising novel alternative to titanium is polyetheretherketone (PEEK) which is a partially crystalline poly aromatic linear thermoplastic substance. The objective of this study is to study and compare the mechanical properties of titanium, zirconium and PEEK implant materials using three dimensional finite element analysis. Methodology: A randomly chosen computerized tomography was used to obtain the digital model in the initial phase of the work. Only the part portion corresponding to tooth number 35 will be extracted from this model. Screwed cylindrical implants of length 12 mm and diameter 4mm will be modeled and simulated to be placed in the section of the bone. The different models used were model A - Titanium, model B – Zirconium, and model C - PEEK implant models. All models were identical, except for the properties of the used materials and all were exported to the Ansys Workbench V10 finite elements simulation software. Vertical and oblique (45 degree) loads in relation to the long axis of the tooth with 100 N in magnitude were applied. Stress analysis performed by comparing the Von Mises stress components. Fatigue strength and mode of failure were also assessed for the three implant materials. Results: Maximum stress in the peri-implant bone when titanium implant was placed in 35 region was 281.40 Mpa under axial load of 100N. Maximum stress when zirconia implant was placed is 277.99 MPa and when peek implant was placed which amounts for 286.78Mpa. Titanium sustains more life cycle (832840.00) compared to Zirconium (743070.00) and PEEK has much less life cycle (302460.00). Factor of safety is rated on a scale of 0 -15 and results were Titanium (12.42) and Zirconium (11.16) had almost similar values. Peek (6.15) had low safety factor compared to Titanium and Zirconia. Conclusion:Titanium was superior to other two groups in all the properties considered. These results prove why Titanium is still considered to be the gold standard material of choice for dental implant fabrication.