Net shape fabrication of calcium phosphate scaffolds with multiple material domains

Abstract

Calcium phosphate (CaP) materials have been proven to be efficacious as bone scaffold materials, but are difficult to fabricate into complex architectures because of the high processing temperatures required. In contrast, polymeric materials are easily formed into scaffolds with near-net-shape forms of patient-specific defects and with domains of different materials; however, they have reduced load-bearing capacity compared to CaPs. To preserve the merits of CaP scaffolds and enable advanced scaffold manufacturing, this manuscript describes an additive manufacturing process that is coupled with a mold support for overhanging features; we demonstrate that this process enables the fabrication of CaP scaffolds that have both complex, near-net-shape contours and distinct domains with different microstructures. First, we use a set of canonical structures to study the manufacture of complex contours and distinct regions of different material domains within a mold. We then apply these capabilities to the fabrication of a scaffold that is designed for a 5 cm orbital socket defect. This scaffold has complex external contours, interconnected porosity on the order of 300 μm throughout, and two distinct domains of different material microstructures.