Synthesis and fabrication of bioactive glass for bone implant using 3D printing setup

Large bone defects require supporting structures that will assist in regenerating the bone defects. Traditional techniques such as allografting and autografting pose issues like unavailability of the donor site and lack of longevity. Bioactive glass implants that bond to the host tissue and aid in bone regeneration have been used to overcome these issues. Bioactive glass implants, which adhere to host tissue, aid in bone regrowth. These traditional fabrication techniques lack the required mechanical characteristics. Porous bioactive glass implants are suitable for bone tissue engineering due to additive manufacturing processes like robocasting. Several compositions of glasses viz. 45S5 and 58S have been used previously. Using a 3D printing setup for the fabrication of implants, better control of scaffold architecture and mechanical properties can be achieved. Robocasting is an effective 3D printing technique to build porous bioactive glass implants. The sol-gel process and robocasting technique include several parameters that affect the performance of the bioactive glass implants. In this work, 45S5 bioactive glass was synthesized using the sol-gel method. Further, the influence of the aging period on the morphology, structure, and particle size was studied by material characterization methods. Finally, porous scaffolds of 45S5 bioactive material were fabricated using an in-house developed robocasting 3D printer setup.