3D printed bioceramics derived from preceramic polymers are of great interest in bone tissue engineering due to their simplified fabrication processes. In this study, three-dimensional (3D) porous β-Ca₂SiO₄ scaffolds incorporated with ZrO₂ were fabricated from silicone resin loaded with active CaCO₃ and inert ZrO₂ fillers by 3D printing. The fabricated scaffolds possessed uniform interconnected macropores with a high porosity (> 67%). The results showed that the increase of ZrO₂ incorporation significantly enhanced the compressive strength, and stimulated cell proliferation and differentiation of osteoblasts. Importantly, the in vivo results indicated that the ZrO₂-incorporated β-Ca₂SiO₄ scaffolds improved osteogenic capacity compared to pure β-Ca₂SiO₄ scaffolds. Taken together, the ZrO₂-incorporated β-Ca₂SiO₄ scaffolds fabricated by combining polymer-derived strategy with 3D printing could be a promising candidate for bone tissue engineering.

The CaO-SiO₂-P₂O₅ bioglass (BG) microspheres with good bioactivity and osteoconductivity have been extensively studied for bone tissue engineering. Traditional melting method for preparing BG powders is high energy consumption, and difficult to control the morphology of BG. While Sol-Gel technique for BG preparation requires a large amount of organic solvent, long preparation period and low mass production. For the rapid and scalable preparation of BG microspheres with controllable morphology, particle size and chemical composition, an efficient strategy of spray drying of precursor solution was proposed in this study, and the effects of process parameters including inlet air volume, precursor solution concentration and feed rate on the particle size of BG microspheres, and the effect of chemical composition on the apatite formation ability of BG microspheres in vitro were investigated. The results showed that the particle sizes of BG microspheres via spray drying could be controlled below 40 μm, and the particle sizes of BG microspheres increased with the concentration of precursor solution, and decreased with the increase of inlet air volume, but the feed rate has a slight effect on the particle size of the microspheres. On the other hand, BG microspheres with different chemical compositions had good ability to induce apatite formation in vitro, and it increased with the increase of CaO content. Therefore, spray drying method would be promising for rapid and scalable preparation of BG microspheres.

Organic-inorganic hybrid mesoporous organosilica has gained more attention in biomedicine due to its high surface area, mesoporous channels, functional framework, and high drug loading capacity. In this study, disulfide- bridged hybrid mesoporous organosilica nanoparticles (MONs) as nanocarriers were employed to construct a nanosystem (ICG/DOX-MONs@DNA₂₀) for delivering drugs and photothermal agents, in which DNA molecules as “switches” were modified on the surface of MONs to control drug release. The results showed that the ICG/DOX-MONs@DNA₂₀ nanosystem could increase the temperature to above 43 ℃ for photothermal therapy with near-infrared (NIR) laser irradiation. On the other hand, the ICG/DOX-MONs@DNA₂₀ nanosystem exhibited a very slow release of DOX (12.3% in 6 h) at 37 ℃, but a rapid release of DOX (52.4% in 6 h) occurred at 43 ℃. Cell culture experiments indicated that the nanosystem can be internalized by HeLa cells, and exhibited an enhanced therapeutic efficacy of synergistic chemo- and photothermal therapy. Hence, the ICG/DOX-MONs@DNA₂₀ nanosystem might be promising for synergistic chemo- and photo-thermal tumor therapy.

High-entropy ceramics, a novel class of single-phase ceramic solid solutions consisting of near-equimolar multielement species, are recently attracting tremendous attentions. Especially, the transition metal non-oxide high-entropy ceramics, such as transition metal carbide and boride high-entropy ceramics, have been proposed for potential applications in aerospace, nuclear energy, high-speed machining and many other extreme environments, owing to their excellent physical and chemical properties including super-high hardness, low thermal conductivity, good oxidation resistance and corrosion/erosion resistance. Recently, the research of high-entropy ceramics is only focused on composition design, fabrication methods, single-phase stability and mechanical properties, but the design criterion and theoretical analysis are rarely reported. Based on the researches of high-entropy alloy, the fabrication, characterization and theoretical study of several transition metal non-oxide high-entropy ceramics are summarized, along with some related results of high-entropy film. The prospects for the future developments of high-entropy ceramics are also discussed.

As for ceramic stereolithography technique, the preparation of suitable resin-based ceramic slurry is of primary importance. In this study, the effects of powder characteristics such as specific surface area, particle size and distribution, particle morphology on the rheological behavior of zirconia resin-based suspensions were investigated intensively. Results show that the specific surface area of the powder is the most important factor affecting slurry viscosity. Choosing low specific surface area and quasi-spherical shaped powder is more likely to obtain low viscosity slurries. In addition, the influence of solid loading on the flow behavior were also studied using Krieger-Dougherty model. Zirconia samples with the relative density of (97.83±0.33)% were obtained after sintering at 1550 ℃. No obvious abnormal grain growth in the microstructure of the sintered body is observed. Results indicate that after the optimization of the processing parameters with the help of rheology characterization, complex-shaped high-quality zirconia parts can be obtained using the stereolithography technique.