Solvent-Free Three-Dimensional Printing of Biodegradable Elastomers Using Liquid Macrophotoinitiators

Journal article (2021)

Authors

Matthias Sandmeier ETH Zürich
Nevena Paunović ETH Zürich
Riccardo Conti ETH Zürich
Leopold Hofmann ETH Zürich
Jieping Wang ETH Zürich
Zhi Luo ETH Zürich
K. Masania ETH Zürich, Aerospace Manufacturing Technologies - Aerospace Engineering
N. Wu Lab of Organic Chemistry, ETH Zürich, Team Bart De Schutter - Mechanical, Maritime and Materials Engineering
Nicole Kleger ETH Zürich
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Research Group
Aerospace Manufacturing Technologies (Aerospace Engineering) (TU Delft)
Copyright: © 2021 Matthias Sandmeier, Nevena Paunović, Riccardo Conti, Leopold Hofmann, Jieping Wang, Zhi Luo, K. Masania, N. Wu, Nicole Kleger, More Authors
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.macromol.1c00856
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Published Date

2021

Language

English

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Faculty

Aerospace Engineering

Department

Aerospace Structures & Materials

Research Group

Aerospace Manufacturing Technologies

Abstract

Vat photopolymerization 3D printing provides new opportunities for the fabrication of tissue scaffolds and medical devices. However, for the manufacturing of biodegradable elastomers, it usually requires the use of organic solvents to dissolve the solid photoinitators and achieve low resin viscosity, making this process environmentally unfriendly and not optimal for biomedical applications. Here, we report solvent-free 3D printing of biodegradable elastomers by digital light processing with well-defined photoinitiator-polymer conjugates. Being in liquid state at room temperature, the macrophotoinitiators enabled high-quality 3D printing in the absence of any organic solvents that are usually used in digital light 3D printing. This allowed the systematic investigation of structure-property relationships of 3D-printed biodegradable elastomers without the interference from reactive diluents. The developed macrophotoinitiators were compatible with various photopolymers and could be applied for solvent-free fabrication of biodegradable shape-memory devices. This work offers new perspectives for the solvent-free additive manufacturing of bioresorbable medical implants and other functional devices.