EUROPEAN CONGRESS AND EXHIBITION ON ADVANCED MATERIALS AND PROCESSES - EUROMAT 2021

Additive Manufacturing offers the possibility to perform personalized medicine since patient-specific structures can be fabricated quickly and reliable. The production of orthopedic implants by additive manufacturing could greatly benefit from multi-materials because the skeletal system is composed of hard bones and softer cartilages that perform different tasks in the body. Medical-grade materials should be used to manufacture multi-material implant structures; among these materials, polyurethanes might be good candidates since they can be produced with different hardness, are biocompatible, and can withstand in-body conditions for extended periods. In this study, two medical-grade polyurethanes produced by DSM BioMedical with hardness values of 75 D and 80 A, respectably were used to fabricate three-dimensional structures using a thermoplastic material jetting technique (MJT) known as ARBURG Plastic Freeforming (APF). Tensile and bending specimens were produced using optimized APF processing parameters with the individual polyurethanes. Subsequently, multi-material specimens were manufactured in order to analyze the cohesion at the interface between the two polyurethanes. Based on the information gathered, recommendations are made for the preparation of implantable structures, such as rib replacement systems.