The temporary structures, which can be degraded away with a biocompatible chemical trigger, could be useful in fabricating microfluidic devices, creating biomaterials that respond dynamically to stimuli and in patterning artificial tissue.
Brown University engineers have demonstrated a technique for making 3-D-printed biomaterials that can degrade on demand, which can be useful in making intricately patterned microfluidic devices or in making cell cultures than can change dynamically during experiments.
“It’s a bit like Legos,” said Ian Wong, an assistant professor in Brown’s School of Engineering and co-author of the research. “We can attach polymers together to build 3-D structures, and then gently detach them again under biocompatible conditions.”
The research is published in the journal Lab on a Chip.
The Brown team made their new degradable structures using a type of 3-D printing called stereolithography. The technique uses an ultraviolet laser controlled by a computer-aided design system to trace patterns across the surface of a photoactive polymer solution. The light causes the polymers to link together, forming solid 3-D structures from the solution. The tracing process is repeated until an entire object is built from the bottom up.
Stereolithographic printing usually uses photoactive polymers that link together with covalent bonds, which are strong but irreversible. For this new study, Wong and his colleagues wanted to try creating structures with potentially reversible ionic bonds, which had never been done before using light-based 3-D printing. To do it, the researchers made precursor solutions with sodium alginate, a compound derived from seaweed that is known to be capable of ionic crosslinking.
“The idea is that the attachments between polymers should come apart when the ions are removed, which we can do by adding a chelating agent that grabs all the ions,” Wong said. “This way we can pattern transient structures that dissolve away when we want them to.”
The researchers showed that alginate could indeed be used in stereolithography. And by using different combinations of ionic salts — magnesium, barium and calcium — they could create structures with varying stiffness, which could then be dissolved away at varying rates.
The research also showed several ways in such temporary alginate structures could be useful.
“It’s a helpful tool for fabrication,” said Thomas M. Valentin, a Ph.D. student in Wong’s lab at Brown and the study’s lead author. The researchers showed that they could use alginate as a template for making lab-on-a-chip devices with complex microfluidic channels.
“We can print the shape of the channel using alginate, then print a permanent structure around it using a second biomaterial,” Valentin said. “Then we simply dissolve away the alginate and we have a hollow channel. We don’t have to do any cutting or complex assembly.”
The researchers also showed that degradable alginate structures are useful for making dynamic environments for experiments with live cells. They performed a series of experiments with alginate barriers surrounded by human mammary cells, observing how the cells migrate when the barrier is dissolved away. These kinds of experiments can be useful in investigating wound-healing processes or the migration of cells in cancer.
The experiments showed that neither the alginate barrier nor the chelating agent used to dissolve it away had any appreciable toxicity to the cells. That suggests that degradable alginate barriers are a promising option for such experiments.
The biocompatibility of the alginate is promising for additional future applications, including in making scaffolds for artificial tissue and organs, the researchers say.
“We can start to think about using this in artificial tissues where you might want channels running through it that mimic blood vessels,” Wong said. “We could potentially template that vasculature using alginate and then dissolve it away like we did for the microfluidic channels.”
The researchers plan to continue experimenting with their alginate structures, looking for ways to fine-tune their strength and stiffness properties, as well as the pace of degradation.
Learn more: Researchers develop 3-D-printed biomaterials that degrade on demand
The Latest on: 3-D-printed biomaterials
[google_news title=”” keyword=”3-D-printed biomaterials” num_posts=”10″ blurb_length=”0″ show_thumb=”left”]- Tooth Regeneration Market To Reach USD 8.5 Billion By 2032 | DataHorizzon Researchon May 11, 2024 at 5:29 am
The tooth regeneration market size was valued at USD 4.9 Billion in 2023 and is expected to reach a market size of USD 8.5 Billion by 2032 at a CAGR of 6.3%.Fort Collins, Colorado (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- ...
- USP’s Segmenta Project Revolutionizes Health Sector with 3D Models of Human Anatomyon May 8, 2024 at 6:07 pm
The Segmenta Project, developed by USP professors in partnership with several institutions, emerged with a proposal to assist the teaching of people with visual impairments through the production of ...
- Are Composite Biomaterials the Future of Orthopedic Surgery?on May 8, 2024 at 5:00 pm
Composite biomaterials are engineered by combining two or more distinct ... One key area is additive manufacturing, including 3D printing, which could enable the creation of patient-specific implants ...
- Engineered living materials: Scientists 3D print with bio-ink made from tobacco cellson May 1, 2024 at 5:03 am
Also known as EPLMs, “engineered plant living materials” are a new frontier that marries synthetic biology and 3D printing, an invention that’s inspired many improvements to the mechanism itself as ...
- 3 3D Printing Stocks With the Potential to Make You an Overnight Millionaireon April 30, 2024 at 4:07 am
Today, major players in the early days of 3D printing are not as far along as many analysts had hoped. However, companies that strategically position themselves within the 3-D printing industry as ...
- 3D Printing Medical Devices Market Set to Grow to USD 10.67 Billion by 2031 Owing to Growing Demand for Personalized Medical Solutionson April 25, 2024 at 9:38 am
D Printing Medical Devices Market Set to Grow to USD 1067 Billion by 2031 Owing to Growing Demand for Personalized Medical Solutions ...
- 3D Printing: The Latest Architecture and Newson April 14, 2024 at 5:00 pm
As an additive manufacturing method, 3D printing has been characterized by the construction of objects through the horizontal deposition of material, layer by layer. This still restricts ...
- Inside a recyclable 3D-printed tiny homeon January 31, 2024 at 4:28 am
It's 60 feet long (18.3 meters), 22 feet ... the first prototype of a small 3D-printed house with a living room, bedroom, kitchen and bath was ready. The surfaces were created with layer-upon-layer of ...
- Biomedical 3D Printing: Research Landscape, Applications, and New Innovative Materialson April 5, 2023 at 9:52 am
as they share their insights on the latest advancements in biomedical 3D printing research, tissue engineering, biomaterials, and bioprinting strategies. Discover cutting-edge developments in wound ...
- 3D Printed Radiation Shields Get Put To The Teston February 5, 2022 at 1:19 am
Design and Implementation of 3-D Printed Radiation Shields for Environmental Sensors not only tests how effective these low-cost shields are when compared to an uncovered sensor, but addresses ...
via Google News and Bing News