TABLE 1.
Studies presenting the survival rates of cells used as bioink for 3D-bioprinting applications.
| Author, year | 3D Printer | Cell types | Survival rates | Comments/Other findings |
| Inkjet bioprinting | ||||
| Christensen et al. (2015) | Thermal inkjet printing | Chinese hamster ovary cells and primary embryonic motor neurons from ventral cords of 14-day embryos from pregnant Sprague-Dawley rats | Greater than 90% cellular viability after printing. | |
| Saunders et al. (2007) | Piezoelectric drop-on-demand inkjet printing | HT 1080 human fibroblasts | Cellular survival of 94–98%. | Survival rates decrease with increased printing pulse amplitude. Sampled printed at 40v demonstrated survival rates that could not be distinguished from unprinted control samples. |
| Cui et al. (2010) | Thermal inkjet printing | Green fluorescent protein expressing Chinese hamster ovary cells | Average cellular viability was 89%. | No significant difference in viability was observed in different cellular concentrations of ink. Printed cell number correlated with increasing cellular ink concentrations. |
| Christensen et al. (2015) | Inkjet based free form fabrication | NIH 3T3 mouse fibroblasts | Post printed cellular viability was 92.4% immediately after printing and 90.8% after 24 h of incubation. | |
| Levato et al. (2014) | Bioscaffolder system (Levato et al., 2014) | Mesenchymal stem cells from 2 to 4 weeks old Lewis rats | Post dispensing viability was 80% after 1 day and more than 90% after 3 days. | Pre-seeded particles suspended in the gels had the lowest number of viable cells (60%) after 1 day of culture, which increased to 90% after 3 days. |
| Du et al. (2015) | Inkjet with four independent z-axis-controlled ink reservoirs | Bone mesenchymal stem cells from 4-weeks-old male adult Sprague-Dawley rats | Cellular viability of > 90% was seen during printing | CBD-BMP2-collagen microfibers induced BMSC differentiation into osteocytes within 14 days more efficiently than the osteogenic medium. |
| Extrusion bioprinting | ||||
| Zhao et al. (2014) | Microextrusion printing | HeLa cells | Post printed viability of the HeLa cells in constructs was 94.9% ± 2.2% with parameters of 10 mm3 min–1 extrusion speed, 250 μm nozzle inner diameter, 10°C chamber temperature and 25°C nozzle temperature. | Comparisons of 3D and 2D tumor models of HeLa cells show a higher cellular proliferation rate and more simulated tumor characteristics with 3D printing |
| Zhao et al., 2015 | Four nozzle microextrusion printing | A549 cells | Cell survival rate was > 90% for all rheological conditions at a holding temperature of 20° | For all concentrations of bioink used in microextrusion printing, a holding temperature of 20° should be used. Optimum holding times were variable, dependent upon bioink concentration |
| Laser assisted bioprinting | ||||
| Barron et al. (2005) | BioLPTM Biological Laser Printing | Human osteosarcoma cells | After six days of incubation, cells demonstrated a 100% viability | |
| Koch et al. (2010) | Laser based printing based on laser assisted forward transfer (LIFT) | Skin cell lines (fibroblasts, keratinocytes); Human mesenchymal stem cells | 98% ± 1% standard error of the mean (skin cells) and 90% ± 10% (hMSC). | No increase in apoptosis or DNA fragmentation was seen with the use of LIFT. hMSC phenotype was maintained as proven by fluorescence activated cell sorting analysis. |
| Hopp et al. (2012) | Femtosecond KrF laser in laser assisted forward transfer (LIFT) | Human neuroblastoma, chronic myeloid leukemia and osteogenic sarcoma cell lines and primary astroglial rat cells | Short-term and long-term survival for neuroblastoma and astroglial cells was 65–70%. Long term survival of osteosarcoma cells was low, while myeloid leukemia cells did not tolerate the procedure under the conditions. | |
| Stereolithography bioprinting | ||||
| Arcaute et al. (2006) | Stereolithography bioprinting | Human dermal fibroblasts | Cell viability was at least 87% at 2 and 24 h following fabrication. | |
| Raman et al. (2016) | High-resolution projection stereolithography bioprinting | fibroblasts (3T3), myoblasts (C2C12), endothelial (C166), and bone marrow stromal (D1) cells | Cells encapsulated in the lower molecular weight polymer demonstrate a viability of 70% ± 10%, whereas cells encapsulated in the higher molecular weight polymer demonstrate a viability of 93% ± 3% on day 1 after printing for 3T3 cells. In the long term (2 weeks) cell viability in low molecular weight does not significantly change, but cell viability in high molecular weight significantly increases. | |
| Electrospinning-based bioprinting | ||||
| Visser et al. (2015) | Electrospinning-based bioprinting | Chondrocytes | Chondrocytes maintained high cell viability (∼80%) on days 1 and 7. | |