(671d) Additive Manufacturing of Multicompenent Biomaterials

Additive manufacturing, including 3D printing and 3D bio-printing, are enabling the prototyping and production of geometrically-defined and patient specific biomaterials.¹ Despite the many recent advances in additive manufacturing technologies,^2,3 there remains limitations in the speed of production, access to a broad range of materials, and easy integration of multiple materials and cells within a single device. Here, we present a facile manner to produce rapidly multicomponent biomaterials with defined geometry incorporating both structural and mechanical support from polymeric constituents (e.g., (meth)acrylates, polycaprolactone, poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid)) as well as cellular and tissue integration from hydrogels (e.g., poly(ethylene glycol) based, collagen/elastin based, gelatin methacryloyl based). This process integrates the benefits of additive manufacturing with the benefits of hydrogel biomaterials by enabling cell-laden biomaterials with defined structure and mechanical integrity. In addition, the process can access a variety of applications on account of its scalability and versatility. We demonstrate the efficacy of this approach to fabricate cell-laden biomaterials for ex vivo models of functional tissue as well as for on scale tissues for regenerative medicine applications. Overall, this presentation will present a facile process of multicomponent biomaterial fabrication and illustrate how this contributes to the emerging field of additive manufacturing in biotechnology and medicine.

References

1. Murphy SV et al. Nat Biotech 32 (2014) 773-785
2. Appel EA et al. Chem Soc Rev 107 (2010) 18392-18397
3. Kang HW et al. Nat Biotech 34 (2016) 312-319