Aqueous sol-gel chemistry routes based on ammonium-hydrogen phosphate as the phosphorus precursor and calcium acetate monohydrate as source of calcium ions have been developed to prepare calcium hydroxyapatite samples with different morphological properties. In the sol-gel processes, an aqueous solutions of ethylene diamine tetra-acetic acid (EDTA) or tartaric acid (TA) as complexing agents were added to the reaction mixture. The monophasic Ca-10(PO4)(6)(OH)(2) samples were obtained by calcination of precursor gels for 5 h at 1000 degrees C. The phase transformations, composition and micro-structural features in the polycrystalline samples were studied by thermoanalytical methods (TGA/DTA), infrared spectroscopy (IR), X-ray powder diffraction analysis (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). It was shown that adjusting the nature of complexing agent in the aqueous sol-gel processing can be used to control the morphology of the ceramic samples. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.