Light-based Printing Research Articles

3D printing of conductive organic polymers: challenges and opportunities towards dynamic and electrically responsive materials

Since their discovery, conducting polymers have been the subject of longstanding attention for the development of electrically responsive devices. Modern methodologies of manufacturing, including additive manufacturing, are increasingly used in order to create three dimensional systems with controlled architectures. The merging of the two research areas is challenging, given the peculiar macromolecular and chemical characteristics of conductive polymers. We report here an overview about different 3D printing techniques, such as inkjet, extrusion, and light-based printing, for the production of electrically responsive functional materials and devitces for sensing, biosensing or actuative purposes. Recent examples in which the three main classes of conductive polymers, namely, polyaniline, poly(dioxy-3,4-ethylenethiophene) and polypyrrole have been processed with additive manufacturing techniques are sequentially presented.

Volumetric Bioprinting of Organoids and Optically Tuned Hydrogels to Build Liver‐Like Metabolic Biofactories (Adv. Mater. 15/2022)

Volumetric Bioprinting Volumetric bioprinting shapes organoid-laden constructs into centimeter-scale assemblies that mimic native liver function. In article number 2110054, Riccardo Levato and co-workers report the development of a hydrogel-based bioresin with tunable optical properties to minimize scattering in light-based printing and ensure high resolution. Organoid viability and maturation is preserved by the shear-stress-free printing, and salient liver functions mature in response to the 3D bioprinted architecture.

Additive Manufacturing of Conducting Polymers: Recent Advances, Challenges, and Opportunities.

Conducting polymers (CPs) have been attracting great attention in the development of (bio)electronic devices. Most of the current devices are rigid two-dimensional systems and possess uncontrollable geometries and architectures that lead to poor mechanical properties presenting ion/electronic diffusion limitations. The goal of the article is to provide an overview about the additive manufacturing (AM) of conducting polymers, which is of paramount importance for the design of future wearable three-dimensional (3D) (bio)electronic devices. Among different 3D printing AM techniques, inkjet, extrusion, electrohydrodynamic, and light-based printing have been mainly used. This review article collects examples of 3D printing of conducting polymers such as poly(3,4-ethylene-dioxythiophene), polypyrrole, and polyaniline. It also shows examples of AM of these polymers combined with other polymers and/or conducting fillers such as carbon nanotubes, graphene, and silver nanowires. Afterward, the foremost applications of CPs processed by 3D printing techniques in the biomedical and energy fields, that is, wearable electronics, sensors, soft robotics for human motion, or health monitoring devices, among others, will be discussed.

3D Bioprinting: A Novel Avenue for Manufacturing Tissues and Organs

Three-dimensional (3D) bioprinting is a rapidly growing technology that has been widely used in tissue engineering, disease studies, and drug screening. It provides the unprecedented capacity of depositing various types of biomaterials, cells, and biomolecules in a layer-by-layer fashion, with precisely controlled spatial distribution. This technology is expected to address the organ-shortage issue in the future. In this review, we first introduce three categories of 3D bioprinting strategies: inkjet-based printing (IBP), extrusion-based printing (EBP), and light-based printing (LBP). Biomaterials and cells, which are normally referred to as “bioinks,” are then discussed. We also systematically describe the recent advancements of 3D bioprinting in fabricating cell-laden artificial tissues and organs with solid or hollow structures, including cartilage, bone, skin, muscle, vascular network, and so on. The development of organs-on-chips utilizing 3D bioprinting technology for drug discovery and toxicity testing is reviewed as well. Finally, the main challenges in current studies and an outlook of the future research of 3D bioprinting are discussed.