Grant: Research Tools and Instruments

A highly interdisciplinary team of researchers at the University of Windsor including polymer, organic, and materials chemists, cell and systems biologists, toxicologists, and materials and civil engineers are working together to develop innovative new bioinks and support materials to increase the functionality of bio-printed experiments. This team includes users looking to print complex organoid, and organ systems including intestines to study the effect of circadian rhythms, livers to study disease initiation and progression in an organ model using human cells, and the Canadian Centre for Alternatives to Animal Methods, which is focused on generating multiple organ models to accelerate and improve the evaluation of drugs and potential toxins. However, this team is interested not only in bioprinting, but in innovating new materials. These include self-immolative biomaterials, plastics that can be depolymerized on command, for additive-subtractive bioprinting; integrating conductive conjugated polymers into networks to provide integrated sensors and/or micro devices into implantable electronics; the printing of flexible electronics into biological matrices though a combined printing-metal deposition technology, and the printing and inclusion of nanoelectronics into organoids for biomolecule detection. All of these technologies require excellent spatial resolution, and a significant flexibility in the types of inks that can be used. Additional innovations include the development of new controlling modules involving ""vision""-input neural networks that will assist users in avoiding failed print jobs, the number one cost involved in bioprinting research. The printers on the market are not sufficiently flexible for these purposes. The requested microfluidic printer is the first machine capable of meeting all of the requirements of these researchers. This bioprinter will not only be used to carry out innovative experiments in biology, toxicology, biotechnology and biomaterial engineering, but will also be used by a very strong research team that looks to generate new tools that will greatly expand the possible experiments that can be conducted, and improve the efficiencies of printing processes more generally.