Fabrication of an inexpensive injection molding instrument for rapid prototyping of high precision parts
Fabrication of an inexpensive injection molding instrument for rapid prototyping of high precision parts
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DOI：
10.1016/j.polymer.2022.125521
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发表时间：
2022-11
期刊：
影响因子：
4.6
通讯作者：
David M. Wirth;Leonard G. McCline;J. Pokorski
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
David M. Wirth;Leonard G. McCline;J. Pokorski
聚合物给药装置是改善世界各地公平分配救命药物的最有希望的途径之一。目前，大多数制造这些设备的研究严重依赖于基于溶剂的方法，限制了可扩展性，可重复性制造，并可能导致细胞毒性。通过传统的热加工方法制造的无溶剂聚合物生物医学植入物消除了这些问题的大部分。然而，它们很难在研究实验室环境中制造。由于聚合物设备的高昂前期成本和进行中试实验所需的大规模，过去对注射成型等制造技术的研究一直受到限制。本研究描述了一种低成本的台式毫升体积真空注射成型系统，该系统能够中试规模注塑任意几何形状的小形状。本文提出的计划向对聚合物装置的中试规模实验感兴趣的学术研究实验室开放了这种方便和可扩展的制造技术。研究了与高分子药物或疫苗递送相关的聚合物，并描述了简单几何部件和无溶剂高分子微针贴片的制造演示。特别是，微针贴片展示了为生物医学相关产品生产精细特征尺寸的能力和局限性。
Polymeric drug delivery devices are among the most promising avenues to improve the equitable distribution of life-saving medications throughout the world. At present, most research into manufacturing these devices relies heavily on solvent-based methods, limiting scalability, reproducible manufacture, and potentially leading to cytotoxicity. Solvent-free polymeric biomedical implants manufactured through traditional thermal processing methods eliminate the bulk of these concerns. However, they are difficult to manufacture in a research laboratory setting. Investigation of manufacturing techniques such as injection molding has been limited in the past due to the high upfront cost of polymer equipment and the large scale necessary to conduct pilot experiments. This study describes a low-cost bench-top milliliter-volume vacuum injection-molding system capable of pilot-scale injection molding of small shapes of arbitrary geometry. The plans presented herein open this convenient and scalable manufacturing technique to academic research laboratories interested in pilot-scale experiments with polymeric devices. Polymers relevant for polymeric drug or vaccine delivery are investigated, and a demonstration of the fabrication of simple geometric parts and solvent-free polymeric microneedle patches is described. In particular, microneedle patches demonstrate the capabilities and limitations of producing fine feature sizes for biomedically relevant products.