Biofabrication in suspension media-a decade of advances.

Abstract

Suspension bath bioprinting, defined as extrusion bioprinting into a suspension bath consisting of a yield-stress material with fast recovery, emerged over a decade ago. Since this time, many suspension baths have been developed from molecular assemblies to granular media and across a range of synthetic and natural polymers. These suspension baths have been applied to the printing of a wide variety of inks for applications in tissue engineering, from<i>in vitro</i>tissue models to implantable constructs. In a scoping search of published literature over the past decade, 254 articles were identified that met various definitions related to suspension baths for biofabrication in order to gain a perspective on the various materials used and their applications; however, the literature is much more broad than this due to the disperse terminology that has been applied to the approach. This article gives a perspective on the progress that has been made in suspension bath printing, including applications of the technology and challenges that exist across the field, as well as provides a look to the future of where such printing methods will make an impact.