RII Track-4: NSF: An Integrated Multiphysics Machine Learning Modeling and Experimental Framework for Optimizing Micro-Needle Patches

微针贴片（MNPs）为儿童和成人针头注射相关的不同问题提供了解决方案，例如针头恐惧症、疼痛、感染，甚至需要专科医生。MNPs提供了一种局部、无痛、安全、高效和具有成本效益的药物和疫苗递送方式。MNPs上的小针几乎是肉眼看不到的。因此，要制造出如此精细的产品，需要最先进的技术。在不同的方法中，最有效的技术之一是增材制造（3D打印），它本身是一个复杂的过程，受各种环境和物理参数的控制。控制和优化不同生产阶段的所有因素是实现MNPs目标设计的关键。最终产品的设计，因此，控制其机械性能。由于优化所涉及的所有参数的过程在计算上非常昂贵，因此将在本项目中应用机器学习技术。为了验证这一假设，斯坦福大学独有的3D打印设备将得到改进。拟议的研究和相关的伙伴关系将通过揭示潜在现象和理论与实验的结合，为开发更有效的MNPs铺平道路。这个研究基础设施改进轨道4 EPSCoR研究人员（RII轨道4）项目将为怀俄明大学（UW）的一位助理教授和一名研究生提供奖学金。在3D打印领域，用于制造MNPs的热门打印技术之一是连续液界面生产（CLIP），这是还原聚合技术的一种。除了制造设备、工艺和材料中涉及的变量外，整个过程发生在多物理场环境中，这使得计算建模的开发变得复杂且耗时。所有这些可变性会导致产生的MNPs与被认为是目标模型之间的可重复性不足、不确定性和不一致性，并且通常不会产生目标结构。减少不确定性是MNPs制造中的突出问题之一，我们的目标是通过在机器学习框架内整合理论和实验测试来研究。我们假设，当在闭环框架中测试大量场景时，就机械稳定性而言，可以产生更准确和有效的MNPs，并且还可以帮助显着降低成本和所需时间。拟议的研究涉及一个实时和监督的过程，可以潜在地改变我们对效率的潜在参数的理解，以及这些影响如何控制性能。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Microneedle patches (MNPs) have provided a solution for different problems associated with needle injection in children and adults such as needle phobia, pain, infection, and even the requirement for a specialist. MNPs deliver a local, pain-free, safe, high-efficiency, and cost-effective way for drug and vaccine delivery. The small needles on MNPs are barely visible to the naked eye. Therefore, manufacturing such products with such details requires state-of-the-art techniques. Among different methods, one of the most efficient techniques is additive manufacturing (3D printing), which itself is a complex process and is controlled by various environmental and physical parameters. Controlling and optimizing all factors at different stages of production is vital for achieving a target design of MNPs. The design of the final product, consequently, controls its mechanical properties. Since the process of optimizing all the parameters involved is computationally very expensive, a machine learning technique will be applied in this project. To test the hypothesis, the 3D printing equipment, which is uniquely available at Stanford University, will be advanced. The proposed research and the associated partnerships will pave the way for developing more efficient MNPs by shedding light on the underlying phenomena and integration of theory and experiments.This Research Infrastructure Improvement Track-4 EPSCoR Research Fellows (RII Track-4) project would provide a fellowship to an Assistant Professor and a graduate student University of Wyoming (UW). In the field of 3D printing, one of the popular printing techniques used in fabricating MNPs is continuous liquid interface production (CLIP), which is a category of vat polymerization technique. Aside from the variables involved in the manufacturing device, processes, and materials, the whole process occurs in a multiphysics environment, which has made the development of computational modeling complicated and time-demanding. All these variabilities can lead to insufficient repeatability, uncertainty, and inconsistency between the produced MNPs, and what is considered the target model, and often the targeted structure is not produced. Reducing uncertainty is one of the prominent problems in MNPs fabrication which we aim to study by integrating both theoretical and experimental tests within the machine-learning framework. We hypothesize that more accurate and effective MNPs, in terms of mechanical stability, can be produced when a large number of scenarios are tested in a closed-loop framework, and it also can help reduce the cost and required time significantly. The proposed research involves a real-time and supervised process that can potentially transform our understanding of the underlying parameters of efficiency and how such effects control the performances.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.