Manufacturing Tantalum Medical Devices
What is Tantalum?
Tantalum is a chemical element with the symbol Ta and atomic number 73 and an atomic mass of 180.94788 u. and a density of 16 g/cm3. Tantalum is very useful when used for a radiopaque marker. The high density of tantalum makes it an ideal fit for visualization under medical imaging equipment.
Tantalum can be annealed to become more malleable for integration into medical device stents without the use of adhesives, welding, or the addition of other bonding agents.
Once integrated easily into implants made from nitinol, cobalt chromium, PEEK or any other implantable grade material, physicians can then use the radiopaque tantalum for tracking the positioning and expansion of stents and catheters.
Tantalum comes in many different shapes and sizes. NPX can source:
From .010” to ~0.125” in diameter.
From .020” to .060” in diameter.
0.0075” (.190mm) – 0.0788” (2mm) diameter wire.
The most common tantalum product used for integration with stents are the tantalum balls/spheres. The tantalum balls can be annealed for easy insertion into eyelets.
