Strong hydrogels fabricated by 3D printing with oppositely charged polymers

21^st International Conference on Advanced Materials & Nanotechnology

September 04-06, 2018 | Zurich, Switzerland

Lin Li and Huijun Li

Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

Posters & Accepted Abstracts: Res. Rev. J Mat. Sci

DOI: 10.4172/2321-6212-C3-021

Abstract

Hydrogels are commonly used to prepare bioinks, as they are soft and hydrophilic as well as possess similarities to biological tissues. Natural hydrogels, such as alginate, gelatin, collagen and chitosan, which show good biocompatibility with nontoxic degradation products, have received great attention in the field of biomedical engineering. However, these natural hydrogels have limitations for their broad applications because they are weak by nature. Therefore, many studies focus on improving mechanical properties of hydrogels. 3D printing is a layer-by-layer printing process, where there are often layer defects or weak interface adhesion in 3D printed layered structures with hydrogels. As a new approach, alternate printing of two kinds of hydrogels maybe possible to overcome the drawbacks of printing one hydrogel alone. Furthermore, alternate printing of two oppositely charged ionic hydrogels is expected to result in a strong interface adhesion between layers, but it has not been found in the literature. In this study, we report a new strategy and approach for fabrication of strong hydrogel constructs with strong interfacial bonding by utilizing the ionic interaction between two oppositely charged hydrogels. Six natural ionic polymers are chosen as the representatives of anionic and cationic hydrogels, respectively. Specific properties such as rheological properties of the prepared hydrogels, shape fidelity of a printed structure, structure integrity of a printed construct in the cell culture medium are investigated. These properties help us to find the best concentration of each hydrogel and the best combinations for bioprinting. The interfacial adhesion properties between the printed hydrogel layers are also examined. Additionally, the biocompatibility of the best pair of bioink is also investigated.

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