TY - JOUR
T1 - Effects of Printing Sequence on the Printing Accuracy of Melt Electrowriting Scaffolds
AU - Zhang, Fucheng
AU - Cao, Kai
AU - Zaeri, Ahmadreza
AU - Zgeib, Ralf
AU - Chang, Robert C.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 Wiley-VCH GmbH.
PY - 2022/9
Y1 - 2022/9
N2 - Melt electrowriting (MEW), an emergent additive manufacturing process, shows significant potential in fabricating high-fidelity fibrous scaffolds for tissue engineering applications. However, fiber deviation can deteriorate the printing accuracy of MEW. To evaluate the printing accuracy, an evaluation protocol along with an index (Ip) is proposed. For the first time, 0–90 patterned and 0–θ patterned scaffolds with varying inter-fiber distances along different printing directions are fabricated to establish the dependence of Ip on two distinct printing sequences. One sequence is the small–large sequence, which first prints the fibers separated by a small inter-fiber distance, followed by fibers separated by a large inter-fiber distance. Alternatively, for the large–small sequence, the fibers separated by a large inter-fiber distance are printed prior to the fibers separated by a small inter-fiber distance. The small–large sequence contributes to larger Ip results compared to the large–small sequence. Moreover, the printing sequence has more significant effects on the Ip for the 0–θ pattern compared to the 0–90 pattern. These differences can be attributed to different fiber morphologies at the intersection points, accompanied by resultantly varying charge amounts, which gives an insight into the cause of fiber deviation phenomena.
AB - Melt electrowriting (MEW), an emergent additive manufacturing process, shows significant potential in fabricating high-fidelity fibrous scaffolds for tissue engineering applications. However, fiber deviation can deteriorate the printing accuracy of MEW. To evaluate the printing accuracy, an evaluation protocol along with an index (Ip) is proposed. For the first time, 0–90 patterned and 0–θ patterned scaffolds with varying inter-fiber distances along different printing directions are fabricated to establish the dependence of Ip on two distinct printing sequences. One sequence is the small–large sequence, which first prints the fibers separated by a small inter-fiber distance, followed by fibers separated by a large inter-fiber distance. Alternatively, for the large–small sequence, the fibers separated by a large inter-fiber distance are printed prior to the fibers separated by a small inter-fiber distance. The small–large sequence contributes to larger Ip results compared to the large–small sequence. Moreover, the printing sequence has more significant effects on the Ip for the 0–θ pattern compared to the 0–90 pattern. These differences can be attributed to different fiber morphologies at the intersection points, accompanied by resultantly varying charge amounts, which gives an insight into the cause of fiber deviation phenomena.
KW - fiber deviation
KW - melt electrohydrodynamic process
KW - printing accuracy
KW - printing evaluation
KW - printing sequence
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U2 - 10.1002/mame.202200222
DO - 10.1002/mame.202200222
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85131940399
SN - 1438-7492
JO - Macromolecular Materials and Engineering
JF - Macromolecular Materials and Engineering
ER -