Hydroxyapatite additive influenced the bioactivity of bioactive nano-titania ceramics and new bone-forming capacity

Bioceramics plays an important role in bone-substitutes. In this study, titania porous ceramics with excellent bioactivity were prepared using hydroxyapatite (HA, 10 vol.% contents) as a grain growth inhibitor. The pure TiO2 porous ceramics were also prepared as a control. After sintered at 1,000 °C with a pressureless sintering method, the particle size of the pure TiO2 and TiO2/HA (10 vol.%) porous ceramics were 450 and 310 nm, respectively. Each of the porous ceramics presented numerous pores, which were cross-connected. The size of the pores ranged from 100 to 300 μm. There were also profuse micropores inside the pore wall and between the particles. A SBF soaking experiment demonstrated that the HA additive played an important role in promoting apatite formation. The cell proliferation demonstrated that osteoblasts on the TiO2/HA (10 vol.%) porous ceramics proliferated faster than that on the pure TiO2 ceramics. The histological sections and EDX assay results of the two porous ceramics also illustrated that TiO2/HA (10 vol.%) composite ceramics combined with Ca and P elements induced much better apatite formation than that of the pure TiO2 ceramics. These results indicated that titania ceramics combined with HA holds great promise for bone-substitutes.