Scaffolds produced with ceramics are commonly used as bone substitute. In this work calcium phosphate materials were used to produce the scaffolds, because HA and TCP have many similarities with bone tissue. For crystalline phase analysis the scaffolds were calcined at 750 °C and sintered at 1330 °C. Electron microscopy images showed HA and TCP nanoparticles and the compounds were identified by Fourier transform infrared spectrometer. X-ray diffraction showed this material to be mostly crystalline. X-ray fluorescence identified chemical contaminants. X-ray micro computerized tomography produces tomographic images of the objects in 360°. In vitro testing was used to study cells behavior in contact with this material in a controlled environment.

The sol-gel process is a technique used to synthesize materials from colloidal suspensions and, therefore, is suitable for preparing materials in the nanoscale. In this work hydroxyapatite was used due to its known properties in tissue engineering. Hydroxyapatite Ca10(PO4)6(OH)2 is a bioactive ceramic which is found in the mineral phase of bone tissue and is known for its great potential in tissue engineering applications. For this reason, this material can be applied as particle aggregates on ceramic slurry, coating or film on materials with a poorer biological response than hydroxyapatite. In this work, hydroxyapatite gel was obtained by the sol-gel process and applied as nanoparticle aggregation in the mixture of hydroxyapatite and tricalcium phosphate to form a ceramic slurry. This process is the polymer foam replication technique used to produce scaffolds, which are used in tissue engineering. For HA gel characterization it was used enviromental scanning electron microscopy (ESEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), electron energy loss spectroscopy (EELS), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and X-ray fluorescence (XRF). The crystallite size was calculated from XRD data using the Scherrer equation. The nanoparticles size before firing was approximately 5nm. The crystallite size calculated after calcination was approximately 63 nm. The EELS results showed that calcium phosphate was obtained before firing. After HA gel calcination at 500 ºC the XRD results showed hydroxyapatite with a small content of beta-TCP. The scaffolds obtained by polymer foam replication technique showed a morphology with adequate porosity for tissue engineering.

Las cerámicas dentales son el material de elección para restauración oral debido a características como adecuada estética, elevada resistencia a la fractura y gran estabilidad química.En la actualidad, los profesionales de la Odontología tienen a su disposición una gran cantidad de sistemas cerámicos de restauración que presentan pequeñas o grandes diferencias en términos químicos, temperatura de procesamiento, resistencia mecánica y aplicación clínica, lo que lleva a sistemas de clasificación de las cerámicas que son poco útiles para profesionales ajenos a la odontología. El presente trabajo tuvo como objetivo hacer una revisión de los sistemas cerámicos de uso dental y presentarlos desde una perspectiva composicional para favorecer el entendimiento de profesionales ajenos a la Odontología. Se hizo un importante esfuerzo para evadir la clasificación que han impuesto las casas comerciales y tener así una rápida compilación de información disponible en la literatura que permita tener una visión general completa, pero no intensiva, del estado del arte de las cerámicas dentales.

Dental ceramics are the preferred materials for oral restoration due to some characteristics, such as adequate esthetics, high fracture strength and chemical stability. Currently, dental professionals have a large amount of ceramic systems to choose from, all of them having small differences regarding their chemistry, processing temperatures, mechanical strength and clinical applications. These differences lead to classification systems that are difficult to understand by professionals outside the dental field. The aim of this work is to review the current dental ceramic systems and present them from a compositional perspective to assure the comprehension of these materials by professionals who belong to the Biomedical Engineering field. A great effort was made to avoid classification methods imposed by manufacturers and to obtain a quick compilation of available information from the literature allowing the reader to have a general view of the state-of-the-art on dental ceramics.