Oxide bioceramics inert ceramic materials in medicine and dentistry

Single oxide ceramics, e.g. aluminium oxide (AI2O3, alumina) and zirconium dioxide (Zr02, zirconia), are bioceramics of an inert nature. An inert ceramic does not form a bonding to bone similar to those bioceramics of bioactive nature. Alumina bioceramics are in the pure aluminium oxide form, whereas zirconia bioceramics are partially stabilized by additional oxides, e.g. yttrium oxide, calcium oxide or magnesium oxide. 

Oxide ceramics exhibit superior mechanical properties, corrosion and wear resistance. Since the oxides are the highest oxidation state of the metal, they are stable even in the most invasive industrial and biomedical environments. Alumina and zirconia are utilized as load-bearing hard tissue replacements and fixation implants in dentistry and surgery. 

Although the use of alumina as implants can be traced back to the 1930s as described by Hulbert et al (1) (Table 5.1), the extensive use of alumina since the 1980s has depended on new powder processing technology enabling grain size reduction of the sintered ceramics from 10 micrometers 

Handbook of Biomaterial Properties. Edited by J. Black and G. Hastings. Published in 1998 by Chapman Hall, London. ISBN 0 412 60330 6. 

Dental implants of polycrystalline alumina were suggested by Sandhaus in Germany (4). Type Tubingen was produced by Frialit in the 1970s. These devices have not been generally accepted, due to the fracture failure of the implants, particularly for those of polycrystalline type produced in 

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Oxide bioceramics inert ceramic materials in medicine and dentistry... 

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