![]() ![]() With our AMULIT support medium, we were able to print off-the-shelf silicone at high resolution, creating features as small as 8 micrometers (around 0.0003 inches) in diameter. We reasoned that most silicone inks would be chemically similar to our silicone support material, thus dramatically reducing interfacial tension, but also different enough to remain separated when put together for 3D printing. Why choose silicone as a support material? The team explains: “We decided to tackle the problem of interfacial tension by developing a support material made from silicone oil. To overcome these challenges, researchers have devised this bath printing process: the idea is to deposit successive layers of material by surrounding it with a silicone oil that acts as a support material. ![]() The researchers relied on the principle of interfacial tension (photo credits: Brighton Science) An Innovative Silicone 3D Printing Process to Reproduce Blood Vessels in the Brain ![]() The difficulty also lies in the complexity of the shapes that can be created: how can we be sure that the structure will not collapse? Therefore, silicone is usually printed in a liquid state before being irreversibly hardened. ![]() But it poses some challenges when it comes to 3D printing: it is a flexible material that cannot be resolidified once melted, unlike the filaments used in FDM/FFF. Silicone has particularly interesting properties including biocompatibility, resistance to heat, chemicals and humidity. With this method, the researchers claim that they can design models of only four micrometers and thus reproduce very accurately the blood vessels in the brain. The latter acts as a printing medium and is, in this case, made of an emulsion of microdroplets of water in silicone oil. To do this, they have developed a process called AMULIT, or additive manufacturing at ultra-low interfacial tension: this approach consists of printing silicone directly into a material bath. At the University of Florida, a team of researchers is attempting to reproduce precise blood vessels in the brain using silicone 3D printing. ![]()
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