Field, J., Haycock, J.W. orcid.org/0000-0002-3950-3583, Boissonade, F.M. et al. (1 more author) (2021) A tuneable, photocurable, poly(caprolactone)-based resin for tissue engineering—synthesis, characterisation and use in stereolithography. Molecules, 26 (5). 1199. ISSN 1420-3049
Abstract
Stereolithography is a useful additive manufacturing technique for the production of scaffolds for tissue engineering. Here we present a tuneable, easy-to-manufacture, photocurable resin for use in stereolithography, based on the widely used biomaterial, poly(caprolactone) (PCL). PCL triol was methacrylated to varying degrees and mixed with photoinitiator to produce a photocurable prepolymer resin, which cured under UV light to produce a cytocompatible material. This study demonstrates that poly(caprolactone) methacrylate (PCLMA) can be produced with a range of mechanical properties and degradation rates. By increasing the degree of methacrylation (DM) of the prepolymer, the Young’s modulus of the crosslinked PCLMA could be varied from 0.12–3.51 MPa. The accelerated degradation rate was also reduced from complete degradation in 17 days to non-significant degradation in 21 days. The additive manufacturing capabilities of the resin were demonstrated by the production of a variety of different 3D structures using micro-stereolithography. Here, β-carotene was used as a novel, cytocompatible photoabsorber and enabled the production of complex geometries by giving control over cure depth. The PCLMA presented here offers an attractive, tuneable biomaterial for the production of tissue engineering scaffolds for a wide range of applications.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). |
Keywords: | microstereolithography; UV curable; polycaprolactone; PCL; methacrylate; methacrylation |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Engineering (Sheffield) > Department of Materials Science and Engineering (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 18 Mar 2021 16:46 |
Last Modified: | 18 Mar 2021 16:46 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | MDPI AG |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.3390/molecules26051199 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:172195 |