Editorial: Recent advances in bioceramics for health

For at least half a century intensive effort has been dedicated to the design and development of inorganic materials functioning as implants to repair damages due to traumas or degenerative pathologies. Particularly, ceramic materials and bio-glasses have been intensively explored for their applicative potential not only with the aim to repair tissues and organs but, ultimately, to regenerate missing tissue regions. In this respect, pushed by ever raising clinical needs with great socio-economic impact, along the recent decades the main focus of scientific research moved from the study of bio-inert materials, designed to function as tissue substitutes but without any relevant bio-functionality, to the development of bioactivematerials and devices. Such constructs are designed to exhibit low chemical stability and suitable nanostructure, thus being able to exchange information with cells and activate the natural physiological processes that can lead to the formation of new healthy and mechanically functional tissue.Moreover, recently the focus of research is increasingly directed towards the development of solutions capable of contrasting the insurgence of infections, which is among the most serious concerns in medicine and a major hindrance to a positive clinical outcome, also due to the ever-increasing bacterial resistance to antibiotics.