Microspheres Online

Everything about microspheres and research utilizing precision spherical particles.

Deformable Conductive Bondline Spacers – Silver-Coated PMMA Microspheres

PMPMS AG 1 5 125 150um Deformable Conductive Bondline Spacers - Silver-Coated PMMA Microspheres

What are bondline spacers? Microspheres are widely used as bond line spacers because today’s technological advancements are demanding tighter and tighter tolerances.  Assembly of many instruments, especially in electronics, optics, biotechnology, calibration, and medical devices, requires holding precise spacing between parts. Depending on the requirements of the application, a rigid non-flexible bond line may be … Read more

Microspheres as Bond Line Spacers in Epoxies

Microspheres as Bond Line Spacer

Spacer Grade Glass Microspheres are presently used in gas plasma displays, automotive mirrors, electronic displays, flip chip technology, filters, sporting goods equipment, calibration standards and transformer manufacturing. Every day engineers are finding new and innovative uses for bond line spacers.

BioCompatability of Metal Coated Spheres

For those scientists?who are looking to use silver coated materials?such as silver coated microspheres in biomedical applications, it is important to understand whether they are bio-compatable.? A selection of abstracts and article references related to the biocompatability of silver follow:

The Biocompatibility of Silver2

The experiments reported have referred to some of the characteristics of the biocompatibility of Ag. Silver has been shown to display interactions with albumin, as an example of a plasma protein, quite different from those of most metals. Such studies shed further light on the complex issue of protein adsorption on biomaterials. It has also been demonstrated that Ag at concentrations < 1 ppm exerts a considerable influence on the activity of lactate dehydrogenase, this effect being reversed in the presence of albumin. A significant but transient increase in blood levels of Ag following intramuscular implantation of the metal has been observed. This is not reflected in any raised urine level. It is proposed that the richly vascular tissue immediately surrounding the implant in the acute phase of the response gives rise to the transient increase, but a subsequent decrease in vascularity reduces this possibility. It appears that Ag released from implants following this initial period substantially remains in the local area.2

Lack of toxicologocial side-effects in silver-coated megaprostheses in humans1

Deep infection of megaprostheses remains a serious complication in orthopedic tumor surgery. Furthermore, reinfection gets a raising problem in revision surgery of patients suffering from infections associated with primary endoprosthetic replacement of the knee and hip joint. These patients will need many revision surgeries and in some cases even an amputation is inevitable. Silver-coated medical devices proved their effectiveness on reducing infections, but toxic side-effects concerning some silver applications have been described as well. Our study reports about a silver-coated megaprosthesis for the first time and can exclude side-effects of silver-coated orthopedic implants in humans. The silver-levels in the blood did not exceed 56.4 parts per billion (ppb) and can be considered as non-toxic. Additionally we could exclude significant changes in liver and kidney functions measured by laboratory values. Histopathologic examination of the periprosthetic environment in two patients showed no signs of foreign body granulomas or chronic inflammation, despite distant effective silver concentrations up to 1626 ppb directly related to the prosthetic surface. In conclusion the silver-coated megaprosthesis allowed a release of silver without showing any local or systemic side-effects.1

Specific Article?References for the biocompatability of silver are below:

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Metal-Coated Microspheres – Conductive Coating

Metal-Coated Microspheres - Hollow Glass

Electrically conductive microspheres are produced by applying a metallic silver coating to the surface of the microspheres, thus giving the advantages of a metal particle with the additional properties of the core microsphere. Typically hollow glass microspheres are silver coated as this offers the combination of a low density filler and a conductive particle. Coatings with EMI shielding of greater than 45db have been produced by adding as little as 20% by weight of M-18 silver coated microspheres.