Tissue engineering and biomimetics with bioceramics

Today the scientific community is intensively devoted to the development of biomaterials exhibiting high mimesis of bone tissues and cell instructive ability, with the purpose of enabling new therapies for tissue regeneration, which is today a clinical need of steadily increasing relevance. In this respect, calcium phosphates are elective materials, due to their composition close to that of mineral bone. In particular, apatites are biomimetic materials that can be synthesized in a wide variety of atomic compositions and under different forms, enabling various applications in bone surgery. Multiple ion doping confers high bioactivity to nanocrystalline apatite phases, and these phases can be obtained as nanopowders, injectable bioactive cements, or as biohybrid materials, by exploiting bioinspired synthesis approaches. As hydroxyapatite can be processed into porous sintered scaffolds for reconstruction of large cranial bones, it can also be processed into three-dimensional biomimetic scaffold exhibiting bone-like composition and nanostructure, and hierarchical organization, thanks to the application of nature-inspired biomorphic transformations. In the coming decades it is expected that novel synthesis approaches developed on a bioinspiration basis will gain ground, as elective methods to obtain tissue-mimicking materials with increased effectiveness in promoting tissue regeneration.