Room temperature synthesis of agarose/sol-gel glass pieces with tailored interconnected porosity

An original shaping technique has been applied to prepare porous bodies at room temperature. Agarose, a biodegradable polysaccharide, was added as binder of a sol-gel glass in powder form, yielding an easy to mold paste. Interconnected tailored porous bodies can be straightforwardly prepared by pouring the slurry into a polymeric scaffold, previously designed by stereolitography, which is subsequently eliminated by alkaline dissolution at room temperature. The so obtained pieces behave like a hydrogel with an enhanced consistency that makes them machinable and easy to manipulate. These materials generate an apatite-like layer when immersed in a simulated body fluid, indicating a potential in vivo bioactivity. The proposed method can be applied to different powdered materials to produce pieces, at room temperature, with various shapes and sizes and with tailored interconnected porosity. (c) 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.