Open pore titanium foams via metal injection molding of metal powder with a space holder

Powder methods are highly applicable for the processing of more challenging metals and forms. Examples of materials that encompass both of these are metallic foams, which are advanced materials that consist of a network of interconnected or randomly spaced macropores separated by dense or microporous cell walls. These macropores can be either open or closed, or mix of those two, depending on the manufacturing process. One popular metal foam that has received a huge amount of interest in the last decade is Ti foam, due to it offering a unique combination of properties, such as high strength to weight ratio and high permeability combined with excellent biocompatibility. In this study the use of metal injection molding of titanium powder in combination with a space holder (to create large pore spaces) is examined for the production of open pore Ti foams for biomedical applications. Potassium chloride with two different particle shapes (spherical and cubic) was used as a space holder. It was found that feedstocks prepared with spherical KCl particles had a lower viscosity and better flowability compared to those made using cubic particles. Ti foams with a total porosity of 61.25% ± 0.29 were successfully produced. The structure of the foams produced was characterized using SEM and X-ray micro-computed tomography.