Designing Advanced Bioinks for 3D Printing Complex Tissue Structures
Abstract
Three-dimensional (3D) printing is an emerging approach for rapid fabrication of complex tissue structures using cell-loaded bioinks. However, 3D bioprinting has hit a bottleneck in progress due to the lack of suitable bioinks that are printable, have high shape fidelity, and are mechanically resilient. In this study, we introduce a novel family of nanoengineered bioinks consisting of Kappa-Carrageenan (κCA) and nanosilicates (nSi). κCA is a biocompatible linear sulfated polysaccharide derived from red algae and is able to undergo quick thermoreversible and ionic gelation. The shear-thinning characteristics of κCA was modified by nanosilicates to develop a printable bioink. By tuning κCA-nanosilicate ratios, the thermoreversible gelation of the bioink can be controlled to obtain high shape retention. The unique aspect of the nanoengineered κCA-nSi bioink is its ability to print closer to physiologically relevant scale tissue constructs than conventional bioinks without requiring secondary supports. We envision that nanoengineered κCA-nSi bioinks can be used to bioprint complex, large-scale, cell-laden tissue constructs with high structural fidelity and mechanical stiffness for applications in custom bioprinted scaffolds and tissue engineered implants.
Subject
BioprintingCitation
Wilson, Scott Andrew (2017). Designing Advanced Bioinks for 3D Printing Complex Tissue Structures. Master's thesis, Texas A&M University. Available electronically from https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /187251.