Three-Dimensional Printing to Build Fibrous Protein Architectures

Abstract

Fibrous proteins are promising bioinks for three-dimensional printing techniques to fabricate sophisticated structures that find applications in both biomedical engineering and materials science. The critical point of manufacturing these fibrous protein inks is to adjust the cross-linking and rheology properties of proteins that matching the requirements of various printing techniques. In recent years, 3D printing techniques such as extrusion-based printing, droplet-based printing, and light-assisted printing techniques have widely been applied to build sophisticated fibrous protein architectures. In this regard, a series of fibrous protein-based bioinks have been developed, such as bioinks prepared from silk fibroin, collagen, fibrin, gelatin, and recombinant spider silk. In this chapter, we present the protocols to make various fibrous protein inks, as well as how to use these bioinks to print 3D structures via different printing techniques.

Keywords: Fibrous proteins; Inks; Three-dimensional printing techniques.