Open AccessNanocrystalline Powders of Alkaline-Earth Phosphates as Precursors for Bioceramics
Author(s) -
Purnendu Parhi,
Arunachalam Ramanan,
Alok R. Ray
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
american journal of biochemistry and biotechnology/american journal of biochemistry and biotechnology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.161
H-Index - 31
eISSN - 1553-3468
pISSN - 1558-6332
DOI - 10.3844/ajbbsp.2006.61.65
Subject(s) - alkaline earth metal , nanocrystalline material , materials science , metallurgy , chemical engineering , earth (classical element) , chemistry , mineralogy , nanotechnology , metal , engineering , physics , mathematical physics
Bone is a nanocomposite made of calcium phosphates and collagen. Collagen has a typical fibrous structure, with diameter ranging from 100 nm to 2 µm. It is suggested that calcium hydroxyapatite, Ca10(PO4)6(OH)2 in the size range 5-50 nm embedded in the collagen framework provides mechanical strength to bone. Among calcium phosphates, apatites are found to be the most suitable for bone regeneration due to its biocompatibility. A contemporary theme is to prepare nanocrystallites of alkaline-earth phosphates that can be employed as precursors for making novel bioceramics. In this paper, we present our attempts to prepare nano-sized particles of alkaline-earth hydroxyapatites, A10(PO4)6(OH)2 where A= Ca, Sr and Ba through a metathetical route. Our work involved the use of same reactants treated under different reaction conditions. While hydrothermal route yielded well-crystalline nanorods, microwave resulted in agglomerated hydroxyapatites and reverse micellear route gave low crystalline apatites with less agglomeration