Improvement of Antibacterial Properties of Stainless Steel by Combining Plasma Cu and Thermal Diffusion

doi:10.3724/SP.J.1077.2012.00519

Abstract

Abstract:

The duplex treatment consisting of plasma surface alloyed with copper followed by thermal diffusion under the bombardment of glow was carried out on AISI 304 stainless steel in order to improve its antibacterial properties. The antibacterial properties against Gram-negative E.coli ATCC10536 and Gram-positive S.aureus ATCC25923 of the untreated and duplex-treated stainless steel were investigated by using a spread plate method. The microstructure, chemical composition and the change of the chemical state of copper on the surface of the duplex treated stainless steel were characterized using scanning electron microscope (SEM), glow discharge optical emission spectroscope (GDOES) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscope (XPS). The results show that the antibacterial rates gradually rise with increase of the contact time between the bacteria and the copper-alloyed stainless steel, and the alloyed surface exhibits excellent antibacterial properties against both E.coli and S.aureus within 12 h. The copper concentration on the alloyed surface reaches to 5.7wt% and the thickness of the alloyed layer is about 2.7 µm. XPS analysis indicated that Cuions was released when the copper-alloyed surface contacted with bacterial solution, which led to death of the bacteria.

Key words: stainless steel, duplex treatment, copper alloyed layer, antibacterial property

CLC Number:

TQ174

ZHANG Xiang-Yu, JIANG Li, HUANG Xiao-Bo, MA Yong, FAN Ai-Lan, TANG Bin. Improvement of Antibacterial Properties of Stainless Steel by Combining Plasma Cu and Thermal Diffusion[J]. Journal of Inorganic Materials, 2012, 27(5): 519-523.

Figures/Tables 5

Table 1 Calculated antibacterial rate of Cu-alloyed stainless steel after a designated contact time with bacterial

Bacterial kinds	Antibacterial rates
Bacterial kinds	1 h	3 h	12 h
E．coli	80%	96%	99.9%
S．aureus	73%	94%	99.9%

Fig. 1 Photos of antibacterial effects of the tested stainless steel against E.coli: (a) control and (b) Cu-alloyed, and S.aureus: (c) control and (d) Cu-alloyed

Fig. 2 SEM image of Cu-alloyed stainless steel and corresponding EDS analysis

Fig. 3 Alloy elements distribution of the Cu-alloyed layer

Fig. 4 XPS spectra of Cu2p3/2 for Cu-alloyed stainless steel before (a) and after (b) contacting the bacterial

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