Background

3D bioprinting is a state-of-the-art approach for high throughput tissue engineering that can replace more cumbersome methods, such as freeze drying, gas foaming, electrospinning, and the like. These approaches do not mimic the natural environment effectively enough for stem cells to efficiently proliferate and form functional tissues. Additionally, these methods are labour intensive, time consuming, and costly. 3D bioprinting solves this problem by providing a reproducible process that can produce customize microstructures. Unfortunately, many bioinks available on the market today do not support the printing of fragile stem cells as these inks do not maintain high cell viability in culture for an extended period of time and do not promote cell differentiation. In addition, conditions during the printing process such as temperature and shear stress can alter the cells phenotype, rendering the cells inviable. There is a need for a bioink that is less labour intensive to generate, maintains cell viability, promotes differentiation and allow for long term culture of functional tissues. Researchers at Axolotl Biosciences have designed a novel bioink that addresses these issues. 

Technology Overview

 Axolotl Biosciences provides turn-key reagents, including bioinks, 3D tissue models, and consulting services in the field of 3D bioprinting to advance tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. Axolotl has developed a novel fibrin-based bioink which generates stable and reproducible 3D-structures. These structures can remain in cultures for over 30 days while maintaining a high level of cell viability and function. The technology supports a wide range of cell lines, such as induced pluripotent stem cells (hiPSCs), neural progenitor cells (NPCs), and the mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs). The applications of the novel bioink are vast and include drug modeling and screening, and development of cell therapies. 

Benefits

• Cells remain viable in long-term culture.
• Stable and reproducible structures.
• Promotes cell differentiation.
• Few production steps to save time.

Applications

• Regenerative medicine.
• Tissue engineering.

Opportunity

• Licensing
• Distribution deals and collaboration