A method of preparing a substrate having a wetting surface, including confirming the presence of an open, interconnected pore network in a ceramic substrate to be wetted with a first metal, filling the open, interconnected pore network with a second metal,

exuding the second metal to coat the surface of the substrate, and wetting the substrate with the first metal. The ceramic substrate is not decomposed by the first metal and the ceramic substrate is not decomposed by the second metal.

In an embodiment, a method of manufacturing customized ceramic labial/lingual orthodontic brackets by additive manufacturing may comprise measuring dentition data of a profile of teeth of a patient, based on the dentition data, creating a three dimensional computer-assisted design (3D CAD) model of the patient's teeth, and saving the 3D CAD model, designing a virtual 3D CAD bracket structure model for a single labial or lingual bracket structure based upon said 3D CAD model, importing data related to the 3D CAD bracket structure model into an additive manufacturing machine, and directly producing the bracket with the additive manufacturing machine by layer manufacturing from an inorganic material including at least one of a ceramic, a polymer-derived ceramic, and a polymer-derived metal.

A method is provided for making ceramic bodies having improved properties, such as optical and/or strength properties in which the ceramic bodies are densified by new sintering processes. The sintering profiles may have shorter run times than conventional sintering processes. Ceramic bodies made by these methods are suitable for use in dental applications, for example, as crowns.

A ceramic waveguide includes: a doped metal oxide ceramic core layer; and at least one cladding layer comprising the metal oxide surrounding the core layer, such that the core layer includes an erbium dopant and at least one rare earth metal dopant being: lanthanum, cerium, praseodymium, neodymium, promethium, samarium, europium, gadolinium, terbium, dysprosium, holmium, thulium, ytterbium, lutetium, scandium, or oxides thereof, or at least one non-rare earth metal dopant comprising zirconium or oxides thereof. Also included is a quantum memory including: at least one doped polycrystalline ceramic optical device with the ceramic waveguide and a method of fabricating the ceramic waveguide.

An armor component and manufacturing thereof which includes a ceramic hard material, where the hard material has a bulk density that is lower than 3.5 g/cm.sup.3 and includes grains of ceramic material having a Vickers hardness that is higher than 15 GPa, bonded by an bonding matrix, the bonding matrix representing between 20 and 80% by weight of the constituent hard material of the ceramic body, and including alumina, silicon nitride and TiC.sub.xN.sub.1-x crystalline phases, wherein x is included between 0 and 1.

An elongate shaped abrasive particle comprises an elongate shaped ceramic body having opposed first and second ends joined to each other by at least two longitudinal sidewalls. At least one of the at least two longitudinal sidewalls is concave along its length. At least one of the first and second ends is a fractured surface. Methods of making elongate shaped abrasive particles and abrasive articles including them are also disclosed.

A method for the additive production of a ceramic main part has the following steps: providing a slip of ceramic base material particles suspended in a liquid phase; producing a slip layer; orienting the radiation of a laser light source onto a section of the slip layer; evaporating liquid phase out of the slip layer in the section of the slip layer onto which the radiation of the laser light source is oriented or was oriented; forming a section of the ceramic main part in the slip layer in a sinter-free manner; optionally repeating the steps of producing a slip layer, orienting the radiation, evaporating the liquid phase, and forming a section of the main part in a sinter-free manner until the ceramic main part is provided; and separating the ceramic main part from the slip.

Particles for a monolithic refractory are made of a spinet porous sintered body which is represented by a chemical formula of MgAl.sub.2O.sub.4, wherein pores having a pore size of 0.01 μm or more and less than 0.8 μm occupy 10 vol % or more and 50 vol % or less with respect to a total volume of pores having a pore size of 10 μm or less in the particles, and the particles for a monolithic refractory have grain size distribution in which particles having a particle size of less than 45 μm occupy 60 vol % or less, particles having a particle size of 45 μm or more and less than 100 μm occupy 20 vol % or more and 60 vol % or less, and particles having a particle size of 100 μm or more and 1000 μm or less occupy 10 vol % or more and 50 vol % or less.

A semiconductor light emitting device comprising a light emitting layer disposed between an n-type region and a p-type region is combined with a ceramic layer which is disposed in a path of light emitted by the light emitting layer. The ceramic layer is composed of or includes a wavelength converting material such as a phosphor. Luminescent ceramic layers according to embodiments of the invention may be more robust and less sensitive to temperature than prior art phosphor layers. In addition, luminescent ceramics may exhibit less scattering and may therefore increase the conversion efficiency over prior art phosphor layers.

An abrasive grain includes a surface having at least a first face with a first outline, and at least one second face with a second outline. The first outline does not contain any vertices, but the second outline contains at least one vertex. The abrasive grain may include a ceramic material, especially polycrystalline α-Al.sub.2O.sub.3.