Post #4

To recap the last blog post, I had run into a few technical issues with the printer softwares. I have now fixed those issues however, the printer itself is outdated so it's motors were not working. This left me with no working printer and little time and resources to buy another one. To fix this massive issue I brainstormed and came to the conclusion that I would make the artery structures by hand as there was no other solution.

My results were inconclusive as there was too much varability in each print that I made. However, I concluded that the ink, GelMA-Pluronic 25%, does not possess the mechanical properties (strain resistance, pressure resistance, & structural strength) required to hold the structure of a artery. The ink is incapable of being able to hold structure and cannot stand stress impacts over .5MPa. This is likely due to the ratio of Pluronic and GelMA, pluronic is roughly 2:1 in the ink and is known to be mechanically weak. This could be the very reason why the structures would cave in on themselves after a couple minutes. Even though in statistical analysis my results are inconclusive, it can still be conluded that this ink is not stable through visual observations and what is already known of the inks seperately.

For future researchers who decide to test this ink, I would reccomend looking at different concentrations and raitos of both of the inks as that could be the key in finding the right ink. GelMA is known to be a mechanically stiff ink, meaning it is not easily manipulated, while Pluronic is known to be mechanically weak so it is easy to manipulate. In theory the combination of both at the right concentration should house the perfect mechanical properities needed for an artery structure. Additionally, both inks are excellent in cell viability and therefore should have no issues in holding cells. What my results show for future research is that the specific concentration of Plu-GelMA 25.7% is not a capable ink, meaning higher concentrations need to be tested to find out whether it is truly just one concentration or this specific ink combination which is incapable.

I wanted to sum all of this up by saying thank you. I appreciate all of you who have been following my blogs and been keeping up my research. This has been a truly educational experience and I am glad to have done this project. I hope you all enjoyed watching my progress as I kept you updated. Thank you for reading!