Material Extrusion-Based Additive Manufacturing of Poly(Lactic Acid) Antibacterial Filaments-A Case Study of Antimicrobial Properties

A Review on Antibacterial Biomaterials in Biomedical Applications: From Materials Perspective to Bioinks Design

In tissue engineering, three-dimensional (3D) printing is an emerging approach to producing functioning tissue constructs to repair wounds and repair or replace sick tissue/organs. It allows for precise control of materials and other components in the tissue constructs in an automated way, potentially permitting great throughput production. An ink made using one or multiple biomaterials can be 3D printed into tissue constructs by the printing process; though promising in tissue engineering, the printed constructs have also been reported to have the ability to lead to the emergence of unforeseen illnesses and failure due to biomaterial-related infections. Numerous approaches and/or strategies have been developed to combat biomaterial-related infections, and among them, natural biomaterials, surface treatment of biomaterials, and incorporating inorganic agents have been widely employed for the construct fabrication by 3D printing. Despite various attempts to synthesize and/or optimize the inks for 3D printing, the incidence of infection in the implanted tissue constructs remains one of the most significant issues. For the first time, here we present an overview of inks with antibacterial properties for 3D printing, focusing on the principles and strategies to accomplish biomaterials with anti-infective properties, and the synthesis of metallic ion-containing ink, chitosan-containing inks, and other antibacterial inks. Related discussions regarding the mechanics of biofilm formation and antibacterial performance are also presented, along with future perspectives of the importance of developing printable inks.

Improvement of Mechanical Property for PLA/TPU Blend by Adding PLA-TPU Copolymers Prepared via In Situ Ring-Opening Polymerization

Polylactic acid (PLA)-thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) copolymer (PTC) was prepared by melting TPU pellets in molten lactide, followed by in situ ring-opening coordination polymerization. The results from FTIR and 1H-NMR confirmed the formation of the copolymer. PLA/TPU blends with different TPU contents were prepared by melt blending method. SEM and mechanical properties showed a conspicuous phase separation between PLA and TPU. In order to further improve the mechanical properties of the blend, PTC was used as the compatibilizer and the effects of the PTC content on the properties of the blend were investigated. The addition of PTC made TPU particles smaller in PLA matrix and improved the compatibility. With the loading of 5 wt.% PTC, the impact strength of the PLA/TPU blend reached 27.8 kJ/m2, which was 31.1% and 68.5% higher than that of the blend without PTC and pure PLA, respectively. As the content of PTC was more than 5 wt.%, the mechanical properties declined since the compatibilizer tended to form separate clusters, which could reduce the part distributed between the dispersed phase and the matrix, leading to a reduction in the compatibility of the blend. Moreover, the DMA results confirmed PTC could improve the compatibility between PLA and TPU.