| Jul 22, 2024 |
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(Nanowerk Information) A analysis group on the College of Virginia College of Engineering and Utilized Science has developed what it believes could possibly be the template for the primary constructing blocks for human-compatible organs printed on demand.
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Liheng Cai, an assistant professor of supplies science and engineering and chemical engineering, and his Ph.D. pupil, Jinchang Zhu, have made biomaterials with managed mechanical properties matching these of assorted human tissues.
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“That’s a big leap compared to existing bioprinting technologies,” Zhu stated.
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They printed the leads to Nature Communications (“Voxelated bioprinting of modular double-network bio-ink droplets”).
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| Paying homage to a raspberry, this voxelated hole sphere made from a single layer of droplets was generated utilizing digital meeting of spherical particles, or DASP, a 3D bioprinting course of developed in assistant professor of supplies science and engineering Liheng Cai’s lab. (Picture: Liheng Cai, College of Virginia College of Engineering and Utilized Science)
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Their distinctive bioprinting technique known as digital meeting of spherical particles. The DASP method deposits particles of biomaterial in a supporting matrix, each of that are water-based, to construct 3D buildings that present an appropriate setting for the cells to develop. The meeting course of is how “voxels,” the 3D model of pixels, assemble 3D objects.
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“Our new hydrogel particles represent the first functional voxel we have ever made,” Zhu stated. “With exact management over mechanical properties, this voxel might function one of many fundamental constructing blocks for our future printing constructs.
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“For example, with this level of control, we could print organoids, which are 3D cell-based models that function as human tissue, to study disease progression in the search for cures.”
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Sturdy and Cell-Pleasant
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The particles are polymer hydrogels engineered to imitate human tissue by tweaking the association and chemical bonds of single-molecule monomers, which hyperlink collectively in chains to type networks.
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Encapsuled inside the particles are precise human cells.
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In comparison with different hydrogel bio-inks, Cai and Zhu’s are much less poisonous and extra biocompatible for cells, they stated. Their “double network” hydrogels — shaped from two intertwined molecular networks — are mechanically sturdy, however extremely tunable for mimicking the bodily traits of human tissue.
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Cai and Zhu first described their DASP expertise in 2021 in Superior Useful Supplies (“Digital Assembly of Spherical Viscoelastic Bio-Ink Particles”). That work proved the idea of utilizing biomaterial voxels as constructing blocks and, via lab experiments, demonstrated a DASP-printed materials that functioned like a pancreas with glucose-stimulated insulin launch.
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However DASP 1.0 might solely print brittle hydrogels with restricted tunability. Of their newest paper in Nature Communications, Cai and Zhu current DASP 2.0, which introduces the double-network hydrogel bio-inks shaped utilizing a “click chemistry” to quickly cross-link, or bond, the molecular buildings.
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The Proper Printer for the Job
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A part of what enabled this development was enhancements to the group’s bioprinter. They designed a multichannel nozzle to combine the hydrogel elements on demand. Premixing isn’t potential as a result of the cross-linking happens so quick, going from liquid droplets to an elastic water-swollen gel inside 60 seconds.
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In a earlier research (Acta Biomaterialia, “All-aqueous printing of viscoelastic droplets in yield-stress fluids”), the group decided that drop formation and speedy detachment from the nozzle are important to imitate the mechanical properties — similar to elasticity or stiffness — of the goal human tissue.
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DASP achieves this by depositing massive droplets from a slim and fast-moving nozzle into the matrix, instantly suspending them.
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“Precise manipulation of viscoelastic voxels represents both a fundamental and technological challenge in soft matter science and 3D bioprinting,” Cai stated in 2022, once they printed their second paper on DASP.
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“We’ve now laid the foundation for voxelated bioprinting,” he stated. “When fully realized, DASP’s applications will include artificial organ transplant, disease and tissue modeling, and screening candidates for new drugs. And it probably won’t stop there.”
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