Historically ceramics are the oldest man-made non-animal-based materials. The use of metals began some thousand of years later and plastics have only become available during the last century. In contrast to this sequence of events, systematic and detailed evaluation of the applicability of ceramics for use in artificial organs or as bone and joint replacements did not start before the 1960s; while metals and plastics had already been in use for several decades. The research work on ceramics soon revealed surprising properties: some ceramics have been shown to be biocompatible in a particular way and tribologically favourable, a surprising type of bonding between some glass-ceramics and bone tissue was, discovered. Biodegradable types of calciumphosphate open the possibilities for temporary implants which need not be removed by a second operation, and there are ceramics which obviously can be used in the cardiovascular system.
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