Colorado School of Mines

1
Colorado School of Mines
SEM Characterzation of Mixtures of
Hydroxylapatite and Tricalcium Phosphate
Ashley Rhodes, CSM Ivar E. Reimanis, Professor,
CSM, and Hans-Joachim Kleebe, Associate
Professor, CSM
pre-sintering
TCP
HAp
Tricalcium phosphate (TCP) and hydroxylapatite
(HAp) are two main constituents used in
processing of artificial bone materials. The
main advantage of these phases is that they can
be resorbed by the human body. It is anticipated
that natural bone grows into the replacement
material as long as the material is sufficiently
porous. Natural bone has a pore size that is
about 100 microns. Therefore, the approach
followed here is to optimize the intrinsic
porosity of the bone-replacement material during
post-sintering of the initial pre-sintered
ceramic body (compare SEM images).
HAp
TCP
post-sintering