Nitinol strips are narrow, soft, and flexible strips of metal made from nickel and titanium. They have large applications in surgical designs, such as stents, guide wires, robotics, and actuators. Their characteristics allow them to be used where their performance and stability are needed in a constantly movable state and under mechanical stresses.
Features of Nitinol Strips
The features below define the uses of Nitinol strips and their advantages in various industries.
- Shape Memory Effect: Nitinol can reset to a predetermined shape after being subjected to certain temperature conditions; therefore, it can be applied where a strip can bend and fold.
- Superelasticity: Nitinol strips provide superelasticity; they undergo large deformations and can return to the original state and free length for dynamic motions.
- Biocompatibility: Nitinol strips are biocompatible and thus can be used in the body and in medical devices that can be implanted into the body to minimise the rate at which the body will reject the device.
- Mechanical Strength: It results from the integrated Nitinol strips, where the frame's strength-to-weight ratios are higher. This means that one can create very light designs without compromising on strength or skill.
- Temperature Sensitivity: Nitinol strips allow for temperature-controlled response with relatively low-temperature fluctuations in applications such as temperature-sensitive actuation and their associated systems.
- Reduced Trauma in Medical Procedures: Medical procedures that require Nitinol strips include those that intrude heavily on the human body.
- Low Fatigue Rate: Nitinol strips have Excellent fatigue resistance and, thus, are employed where they are continuously loaded and unloaded without failure.
Nitinol strips are considered effective materials in several areas, including medicine and engineering.
Applications of Nitinol Strips
Nitinol strip in detail with some major uses and its operational significance in different sectors of industries:
- Medical Devices: Nitinol strips are particularly used in medical applications, especially in stents, guidewires, and catheter applications. Their S.M.E. lets surgeons carry out their surgeries with lesser impact methods, thereby protecting the patient's life.
- Orthopaedic Implants: Nitinol strips are applied to bone-fixing appliances and plates for orthopaedic uses. These properties provide adequate support to the structures and allow different states in body dynamics.
- Aerospace Components: Nitinol strip application in the aerospace industry of material usage of Nitinol strip where strength rather than weight determines its use in any application.
- Automotive Systems: Nitinol strips are increasingly used in the automobile industry in connection with heat-activated, variable-stiffness intelligent structures to increase commercial vehicle capability.
- Consumer Products: Nitinol strips are so strong and yet so elastic that they make many consumer products, such as the latest eyeglass frames, which, after being bent and twisted, return to their normal form.
- Dental Applications: Orthodontic wires contain Nitinol strips because they can bend from applied forces and assume new shapes independently. As such, they explain an efficient treatment plan for corrective therapy of tooth position without putting too much strain on the patient.
- Sports Equipment: Nitinol strips are applied in parts and details, for example, in fishing rods and bicycle frames where high strength and relatively low density of used material are customary.
- Smart Textiles: Nitinol strips are already in smart textiles, especially where the shape memory property can be useful for clothing that changes its size to weather conditions or that will perfectly anatomically fit a particular wearer.
The following applications show how Nitinol strips are even more valuable and useful in different fields.
