Physical characterization of porous hydroxyapatite prepared by slip casting route

Recent developments have led to an interest in the potential of porous hydroxyapatite (HA) as a synthetic bone graft. The starting material, that is HA powder, was prepared by the precipitation method using calcium hydroxide and ortho-phosporic acid. Through this route, the HA powder was first made into a slip by mixing with binder and then the slip was transferred into a mould. The binder was used as the porosifier where different ratios of HA to binder were studied. The material was then dried in oven followed by burning in furnace and finally the porous product was obtained and ready for characterization after sintering. The paper presents some characterization of porous HA products including chemical composition, density and macrostructure. The pore sizes obtained were in the range 200 mm to 400 mm diameters. From the different HA to binder ratios, variation in apparent densities were observed which is in the range of 2.63 to 2.76 g/cm3. The morphology of porous HA was observed by Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) at 15 KV. The chemical structure and composition were also determined using Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and the SEM EDAX, respectively, and the results will also be discussed. (Author)