Typical stents used in surgery today are small metal scaffolds that are inserted inside arteries to prop them open during or after surgery to remove dangerous plaque deposits from the vessels. The stents, which are made of titanium and other metals, enable the arteries to grow new tissue after vessel-clogging plaque deposits have been removed. A major problem, however, is that the body often perceives the metal devices as foreign invaders, hindering endothelial cells from attaching to the scaffolding and prompting the cration of scar tissue, which can build up inside blood vessles and interfere with blood flow.

The research performed by Choudhary, Webster and Haberstroh found that nearly three times as many cells stuck to titanium surfaces containing surface bumps about as wide as 100 nanometers (billionths of a meter). According to Tom Webster, "Ideally, you want endothelial cells to quickly attach to stents and form a coating only one cell layer thick, which we call a monolayer. Otherwise, if the metal is not entirely coated, blood cells passing through the repaired artery come into contact with the metal and recognize it as foreign."

Further research is planned that will replace the titanium disks currently being investigated with tube-shaped pieces of the nano-featured metal, which will resemble the actual shape of real stents. This work has been funded by the National Science Foundation.