Bone grafting is an exceptionally common procedure used to repair bone defects within orthopaedics, craniofacial surgery and dentistry. It is estimated that 2.2 million grafting procedures are performed annually worldwide [1] and maintain a market share of $7 billion in the United States alone [2]. There has been a considerable rise in the interest of using bioactive ceramic materials, such as hydroxyapatite and tricalcium phosphate (TCP), to serve as synthetic replacements for autogenous bone grafts, which suffer from donor site morbidity and limited supply [3]. These ceramic materials (which can be formed into three-dimensional scaffolds) are advantageous due to their inherent biocompatibility, osteoconductivy, osteogenecity and osteointegrity [2], In this study, beta-TCP scaffolds were manufactured through a proprietary injection molding process (Philips Plastic Corporation, Hudson, WI) and subsequently sintered at three different temperatures: 950, 1050 and 1150°C. These scaffolds consist of six approximately 500 μm~2 beams stacked upon one another in orthogonal directions to form a cubic structure (～5 mm~3). Previous work has shown that the nano-scale mechanical properties of ceramic scaffolds influence their overall bioactivity [4,5]. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to determine the effects of sintering temperature on the nano-level mechanical properties of β-TCP scaffolds through nanoindentation.
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