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Phase-field-based modelling of the gelation process of biopolymer droplets in 3D bioprinting

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Abstract

Naturally derived hydrogels are the most common bioink material for droplet-based bioprinting. The mechanical stability of the printed construct and the cell viability are closely related to the gelation process of natural hydrogels, which is initiated by the coil-to-helix transition in a single polymer chain and followed by association of helices. In this study, a phase-field-based modelling approach is employed to simulate the gelation process of microdroplets. A thermo-viscoelastic model incorporating a phase-field variable is used to describe the deformation behaviour of hydrogels in the thermal-induced gelation process. In connection with the gelation kinetics, a new form of the bulk free energy density is proposed to include the free energies related to the mixture of macromolecules in the solution and the coil-to-helix transition. Using the proposed phase-field model, numerical simulations are performed to study the effects of the droplet size and the printing medium on the gelation process of microdroplets.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of General Mechanics, RWTH Aachen University, Aachen, Germany

    Bei Zhou, Yousef Heider, Songyun Ma & Bernd Markert

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  1. Bei Zhou
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  2. Yousef Heider
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Correspondence to Songyun Ma.

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Zhou, B., Heider, Y., Ma, S. et al. Phase-field-based modelling of the gelation process of biopolymer droplets in 3D bioprinting. Comput Mech 63, 1187–1202 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00466-018-1644-z

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