Collaborative Research: Laser-Assisted Orifice-Free Fabrication of Viscous Alginate Microspheres

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The objective of this collaborative study is to test the hypothesis that encapsulated microspheres with a uniform size can be controllably fabricated from a highly viscous fluid system using a novel process not based on the use of an orifice. Orifice-based techniques limit the flexibility in rapidly producing different size microspheres from viscous fluids. The laser-assisted orifice-free fabrication technique, utilizing a metallic foil as the dynamic release layer, will be especially suitable for fluids with a viscosity on the order of 100 mPa's or higher. Key research activities include 1) demonstrating and optimizing the proposed laser-assisted forward transfer technique using the process dynamics knowledge gained from a time-resolved imaging study and mathematical modeling; and 2) elucidating the fluid dynamics of the laser-assisted fabrication of encapsulated microspheres. Sodium alginate will be used as a model fluid to encapsulate living cells. In particular, rat endothelial cell suspension will be added to the sodium alginate solutions as a representative active ingredient to be encapsulated. The fabricated microspheres will be experimentally evaluated in terms of physical and biological properties.Success in this research will expand the knowledge for viscous microsphere fabrication using metallic-foil assisted laser forward transfer. The precise control of viscous encapsulated microsphere size is of great manufacturing importance since the size distribution can determine the success in most microsphere applications such as tissue engineering and drug delivery. Broader impacts also will include a pipeline of well-trained students ready to undertake careers in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics disciplines. With the new knowledge gained from this study, Biomedical Manufacturing and Processing of Biomaterials courses will be further developed to expose students to state-of-the-art advances in manufacturing technologies.