Wen Feng Lu, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering
National University of Singapore
mpelwf@nus.edu.sg
Biography:
Dr. Wen Feng Lu is an Associate Professor at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, National University of Singapore (NUS) and the Trust Lead for Engineering at NUS Centre for Additive Manufacturing (AM.NUS), Singapore. His research interests include Bio-printing; Design for Additive Manufacturing; Data Analytics and Intelligent Manufacturing. He has been actively involved in AM/3DP research program focusing on both biomedical and engineering applications. He has also involved in setting up advanced 3DP laboratories through grants with industrial collaborations. He is currently leading two funded projects in bioprinting. He has published over 250 technical papers in advanced manufacturing and design, and has supervised over 50 graduate students, including 25 PhD students. He is the recipient of 2011 ASME Virtual Environments and Systems Technical Committee Best Paper Award.
Topic title: Design and Optimization of Bioactive 3D Scaffolds for Dentin Repair
Abstract: This paper explores design and optimization of bioactive 3D scaffolds for dentin re-pair by tissue engineering of the dental pulp. The dental pulp, which is the live portion of the tooth comprising blood vessels, nerves and other tissues, is often subjected to decay and necrosis. Root-canal treatment stops further damage but does not restore life to the tooth. Scaffold based tissue engineering strategies are being touted as a replacement to root canal to facilitate regeneration of the pulp.
Scaffolds are porous structures that are commonly used in Tissue Engineering to act as templates to guide the growth of the tissue. The Mechanical and Morphological Characteristics of the scaffold, such as stiffness and surface area of the scaffold are found to influence the growth and differentiation of tissues on the scaffold. The thickness of the scaffold, scaffold pore size and cross section are some key parameters that influence the stiffness of the scaffold. A fabricated scaffold for this studies in shown in Fig. 1. Scaffolds comprising a composite comprising Poly-E-Caprolactone (PCL) and Mineral Trioxide Aggregate (MTA), fabricated through Electrohydrodynamic Jetting are assessed for mechanical and biological compatibility by characterizing mechanical, material, morphological and biological characteristics of the scaffold. With different compositions of these materials, the fabricated scaffolds exhibit different morphologies as shown in Fig. 2 through SEM. Tissue engineering is known to use porous scaffold structures as a template to aid the growth of tissues. The geometry of the scaffold (shape, thickness, and pore size) in turn contributes to these mechanical and morphological characteristics. Considering that cells also need adequate pore space in order to receive nutrition and oxygen, macro-porous scaffolds (pores larger than 100μm) have found increased use in tissue engineering for defect correction.
Optimization Studies based on Taguchi’s Methods were conducted using Taguchi’s Orthogonal Arrays (OA’s) to determine optimum scaffold composition and morphology, including the effects of multiple geometric parameters on the stiffness of the scaffold with a reduced number of experiments. The optimized scaffolds were tested for biological functionality. Dental Pulp Stem Cells (DPSC’s) were cultured on the scaffold and the suitability of the scaffold was assessed invitro through proliferation, differentiation and histological assays. This study provides an insight into tissue engineering strategies for Dental Pulp Tissue Engineering and offers a glimpse into future work with the potential of increasing the efficiency of Dental Pulp Tissue Engineering as an attractive alternate treatment.
