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1. Toying With Design: Experiencing Design for Rapid Prototyping Using Mini-Fabrication Exercises

   https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1115/DETC2018-85769  

   Siddharth Banerjee, Caleb Carithers (November 2018, ASME 2018 International Design Engineering Technical Conferences and Computers and Information in Engineering Conference)

   This study explores the use of mini-fabrication exercises for helping students learn design for rapid prototyping in computer-aided design and prototyping courses in engineering curricula. To this end, we conducted mini-fabrication exercises in ME444 — an undergraduate course at Purdue University. The exercises provide hands-on exposure to design for rapid prototyping principles using simplified design problems. We developed two mini-fabrication exercises in ME444; (i) gear pair design & box design using laser cutting, and (ii) toy catapult design using stereolithography printing. These exercises were tested in a classroom-setting with 51 undergraduate students. Results show the mini-fabrication exercises facilitated students’ learning of geometric dimensioning & tolerancing, part sizing, and material properties in laser cutting and stereolithography printing. 

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2. Rapid prototyping of high-resolution large format microfluidic device through maskless image guided in-situ photopolymerization

   https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-023-40119-x  

   Paul, Ratul; Zhao, Yuwen; Coster, Declan; Qin, Xiaochen; Islam, Khayrul; Wu, Yue; Liu, Yaling (July 2023, Nature Communications)

   Abstract Microfluidic devices have found extensive applications in mechanical, biomedical, chemical, and materials research. However, the high initial cost, low resolution, inferior feature fidelity, poor repeatability, rough surface finish, and long turn-around time of traditional prototyping methods limit their wider adoption. In this study, a strategic approach to a deterministic fabrication process based on in-situ image analysis and intermittent flow control called image-guided in-situ maskless lithography (IGIs-ML), has been proposed to overcome these challenges. By using dynamic image analysis and integrated flow control, IGIs-ML provides superior repeatability and fidelity of densely packed features across a large area and multiple devices. This general and robust approach enables the fabrication of a wide variety of microfluidic devices and resolves critical proximity effect and size limitations in rapid prototyping. The affordability and reliability of IGIs-ML make it a powerful tool for exploring the design space beyond the capabilities of traditional rapid prototyping. 

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3. Toward Vasculature in Skeletal Muscle-on-a-Chip through Thermo-Responsive Sacrificial Templates

   https://doi.org/10.3390/mi11100907  

   Wan, Li; Flegle, James; Ozdoganlar, Burak; LeDuc, Philip (October 2020, Micromachines)

   null (Ed.)

   Developing new approaches for vascularizing synthetic tissue systems will have a tremendous impact in diverse areas. One area where this is particularly important is developing new skeletal muscle tissue systems, which could be utilized in physiological model studies and tissue regeneration. To develop vascularized approaches a microfluidic on-chip design for creating channels in polymer systems can be pursued. Current microfluidic tissue engineering methods include soft lithography, rapid prototyping, and cell printing; however, these have limitations such as having their scaffolding being inorganic, less desirable planar vasculature geometry, low fabrication efficiency, and limited resolution. Here we successfully developed a circular microfluidic channel embedded in a 3D extracellular matrix scaffolding with 3D myogenesis. We used a thermo-responsive polymer approach with micromilling-molding and designed a mixture of polyester wax and paraffin wax to fabricate the sacrificial template for microfluidic channel generation in the scaffolding. These findings will impact a number of fields including biomaterials, biomimetic structures, and personalized medicine in the future. 

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4. Towards Very Low-Cost Iterative Prototyping for Fully Printable Dexterous Soft Robotic Hands

   https://doi.org/10.1109/RoboSoft54090.2022.9762122  

   Bauer, Dominik; Bauer, Cornelia; Lakshmipathy, Arjun; Shu, Roberto; Pollard, Nancy S. (April 2022, International Conference on Soft Robotics (RoboSoft))

   The design and fabrication of soft robot hands is still a time-consuming and difficult process. Advances in rapid prototyping have significantly accelerated the fabrication process while introducing new complexities into the design process. In this work, we present an approach that utilizes novel low-cost fabrication techniques in conjunction with design tools to help soft hand designers systematically take advantage of multi-material 3D printing to create dexterous soft robotic hands. While very low-cost and lightweight, we show that generated designs are highly durable, surprisingly strong, and capable of dexterous grasping. 

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5. Process monitoring and control strategies in extrusion-based bioprinting to fabricate spatially graded structures

   AA Armstrong, A Pfeil (April 2021, Bioprinting)

   null (Ed.)

   Extrusion-based bioprinting is the most common printing technology used in regenerative medicine. Despite recent technological advances, a pressing challenge for extrusion printing is low spatial resolution, which limits the functionality of printed constructs. One of the reasons for the low spatial resolution is a lack of process monitoring and control strategies to monitor fabrication and correct for print errors. Few research efforts implement process control and investigate the relationship between extrusion process parameters and printing fidelity. The lack of understanding between process parameters and print results ultimately limits the complexity of the possible structures. For example, fabrication of structures whose topologies vary spatially within the part is not possible without advanced process control. Here we enable fabrication of advanced spatially graded structures by implementing process monitoring and control strategies. We develop material models to better understand the relationship between process parameters and printing outcomes. We also present an experimental procedure to generate a process map that provides insight into the regions of the processing space that produce the desired extrusion features (e.g., width of the filament). After generation of a process map and material models, we implement a process monitoring and control strategy that measures the feature error and intelligently updates the process control inputs to reduce defects and improve spatial fidelity, which will lead to better functionality of the final construct. 

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