Shape fidelity, mechanical and biological performance of 3D printed polycaprolactone-bioactive glass composite scaffolds.

Direct ink writing (DIW) is a promising extrusion-based 3D printing technology, which employs an ink-deposition nozzle to fabricate 3D scaffold structures with customizable ink formulations for tissue engineering applications. However, determining the optimal DIW process parameters such as temperature, pressure, and speed for the specific ink is essential to achieve high reproducibility of the designed geometry and subsequent mechano-biological performance for different applications, particularly for porous scaffolds of finite sizes (total volume > 1000 mm) and controlled pore size and porosity. The goal of this study was to evaluate the feasibility of fabricating Polycaprolactone (PCL) and bio-active glass (BG) composite-based 3D scaffolds of finite size using DIW.