Towards a Medium/High Load-Bearing Scaffold Fabrication System

Abstract

This paper describes fabrication of scaffolds for load-bearing applications, with primary consideration from the manufacturing perspective. An extrusion device, inspired by the FDM process, was used to create scaffolds from a variety of different polymeric materials and mixtures. The effectiveness of these scaffolds to host cells for bone regeneration has been investigated. This ongoing work has generated significant insight into the future direction of research and the possibilities of developing scaffolds for medium/high load-bearing applications. © 2009 Tsinghua University Press.