Tissues with extracellular matrix, embedded vasculature, and multiple cell types and embedded with growth factors for long duration have been reported to be 3-D bioprinted.

Researchers at Rice University and University of Pennsylvania have developed a 3D Printed Implant with an intricate network of blood vessels using sugar and silicone. This implant will deliver oxygen and nutrients to all cells in an artificial organ or tissue implant and thereby, helping them grow despite body liability to supply them.

Designers at Nottingham Trent University, UK, have discovered microstructure of a 3D-printed bone scaffold. This new scaffold is believed to contain all minerals like natural bone and will dissolve as patient recovers, thereby creating a bridge for tissue regeneration.

Scaffolds offer ways to repair damaged tissues and can allow tissue and cartilages to regrow. With Inkjet 3DP and SLS being the commonly used powder-based tools in biomedical engineering applications, recent advances in mass manufacturing are expected to have an impact on fabricate tissues and biological scaffolds. A study published by the National Institute for Materials Science does highlight the significance of this task.

Students at Rutgers University-Camde, New Jersey, are working with bioprinters for the first time to develop scaffolds for tissues. They are characterizing the materials of scaffolding to determine how applicable they'll be with the cells used to create tissues. On other hand, David Salas-de la Cruz, an assistant professor of chemistry is interested in biodegradable biomaterials.

Rokit, South Korean 3D printing company, received $3M from government last year as a boost and has now appeared with its Edison Invivo 3D Printer to take on Bio-printing market. Edison Invivo uses a bio ink to produce cell structures in the form of organic tissue, and compatible biomaterials include PLGA, PCL, PLLA, collagen, Alginate, Silk fibroi.

An international team, lead by Kwang Kim with University of Nevada, is now developing artificial muscles to give robots the ability to grasp, stretch, and squish objects. These muscles will be printed using a 3D printed electroactive polymer called Ionic Polymer-Metal Composites, which is a synthetic material that changes shape in response to electricity.

Inside 3D Printing Conference & Expo San Diego is going to take place on December 14 and 15 at the San Diego Convention Center, of which the four tracks for the show have been announced recently : The Business Track, The Manufacturing Track, The Medical Track and The Metal Track. The Medical Track at the show will offer insight into the design and manufacturing of customized implants, dental devices, tissues, etc. using a variety of additive technologies. Registration is currently open until September 16.

Amy Karle, from Artist in Residence at Autodesk has used CAD design and 3D Printing to create scaffolds in support of cell growth into certain forms by which 3D Printed framework for tissue generation can be made. She makes her own 3D Printed material using polyethylene (glycol) diacrylate (PEGDA) hydrogel and 3D Printing it by Ember 3D Printer.

The South Korean company, iMakr Med Platform, recently revealed their new 3D Printer called the Rokit Invivo Hybrid Bio 3D Printer, which is set to be sold at $34,000 USD and functions as the first hybrid modular bioprinter. The printer contains Invivo gel that helps constructing 3D tissue scaffolds which can be used for potential transplantation.

This year’s 3D Scaffolds Entrepreneurial Company of the Year Award in the Transformational Healthcare category have been grabbed by Singapore-based company at the Frost & Sullivan Singapore Excellence Awards. Osteopore International for their innovation in 3D Printed Scaffolding that deals with healing of tissue within the human body as well as regeneration. Set up in 1999, Osteopore has been pioneering methods of 3D Printing to provide range of innovations as well as customer satisfaction.

A team of researchers in tissue engineering, 3D biofabrication, biomaterials design and stem cell differentiation at Harvard’s Wyss Institute is working on 3D Printing a Functioning Kidney Subunit with current work to build branched vascular network unique to each organ. Using advanced 3D Bioprinting from Wyss Institute, Dr. Jennifer Lewis’s organ-on-chips are ready, using special polymer inks for creation of structures made up of human cells, complete with vasculatures and extracellular matrices.

Researchers from Imperial College London (ICL) have developed new 3D Printing Technique to create biological replicas for tissue regeneration. In collaboration with Kings College London, they experimented with 3D Printing and Cryogenics using solid Carbon Dioxide (dry ice) to quickly cool down hydrogel ink and Ultimaker 3D Printer. Once the ink softens, it forms a gel as soft as human tissue, which was then seeded with Dermal Fibroblasts with success.

A team from the Polymer Materials for Tissue Engineering and Transplantology Laboratory of Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University (SPbPU) in a joint project with researchers from the Russian Academy of Sciences and Pavlov First St. Petersburg State Medical University, has developed innovative, polymeric medical materials that can be used to fix human organs that have undergone trauma. The team have created a porous, 3D material made of chitosan – a bone tissue analog – and collagen which can mimic the body tissues and prevent itself from being rejected by the immunity of human body.

Researchers at TU Wien (Vienna) have 3D printed a placenta on a chip to specifically study the permeability of the placenta and gain a better understanding of how it works. They developed a special femtosecond laser-based 3D printing process to produce customized hydrogel membranes directly within microfluidic chips, which are then populated with placenta cells. The researchers can use the chip to closely monitor biological parameters such as the pressure, temperature, geometry and nutrient supply of the mini-placenta and also test different drugs on the 3D printed tissue, observing the progression of diseases and the rate of cure.

Researchers from University of Colorado Boulder have developed a 3D printing technique with SLA that allows for localized control of an object’s firmness, which can potentially pave way for tissue 3D printing technique. The layer-by-layer printing method with fine-grain and programmable control over rigidity allows the researchers to mimic the complex geometry of highly structured yet pliable blood vessels. The 3D printer used by the researchers is capable of printing biomaterials as small as 10 microns, or one-tenth the width of a human hair.

Allevi, a Bioprinter Company launched in 2014 has been famous for bioprinters such as Allevi One to Allevi 6, but they are also selling the Ink Kits usable with their printers, aiming at binding customers, getting revenue and building stronger relationship with their customers. After the FRESH Kit, they have launched Coaxial Extrusion Kit, which can create perfusable microchannels with hydrogels and cast endothelial microchannels, thus extending their use in all sorts of tissue types from Cartilage, Skeletal muscle, hearts and tumors.

The Institute for Technology-Inspired Regenerative Medicine (MERLN) at Maastricht University, Netherlands, have announced their partnership with Aspect Biosystems, a tissue engineering and 3D bioprinting company. Through this collaboration, RX1 Bioprinting Platform by Aspect will be placed inside Professor Lorenzo Moroni’s Lab at the university, which then will be used by Dr. Carlos Mota to work towards 3D Printed Kidney Tissue. There, Dr. Carlos Mota, the head of bioprinting research, will put it to good use developing 3D bioprinted kidney tissue.

A group of Portugese Researchers are working towards 4D Bioprinting in Regenerative medicine and ultimately pave the path for bioprinting human tissues for medical uses. With 3D Printing enhanced with 4^th dimension, the researchers point out the potential to have greater control over size, shape and interconnectivity. Through 4D Bioprinting, researchers will be able to morph bioinks into viable cells and tissues without the boundaries of nature, however, this is yet to be explored in terms of temperature, peripheral chemicals, stress and UV light exposure, and ofcourse, the nature itself.

Christen Boyer, a Bioprinting engineer and recent Postdoctoral Fellow at LSU Health Sciences Center in Shreveport, along with vascular cell biologist, tissue engineer, and professor at LSU Health Sciences Center, Steven Alexander; have developed a new technology to 3D Print Polyvinyl Alcohol (PVA) Medical Devices. The method generates biologically compatible 3D printing scaffolds that support cell engraftment because of the high level of protein binding, which is a result of the stabilization process. Working along with Hrishikesh Samant, a transplant surgeon at LSU Health, Boyer and Alexander came up with a novel crosslinked PVA (XL-PVA) 3D printed stent infused with collagen, human placental mesenchymal stem cells (PMSCs), and cholangiocytes. The customized living biliary stents have clinical applications in the setting of malignant and benign bile duct obstructions.