Effect of 3D-printing Conditions of Polylactic Acid Filaments Impregnated by Supercritical Fluids with a Natural Extract

Abstract

Three-dimensional printing is a type of additive manufacturing of great interest in biomedical engineering. The production in situ of customized structures, tissues, implants, or other devices represents a great advance in this field. In addition, the use of polymers functionalized with bioactive substances that improve treatment represents even greater progress. One of these substances could be olive leaf extract (OLE), which has a wide variety of antioxidant compounds of interest for the treatment of heart, neurodegenerative, or oncological diseases. This work analyzes the use of supercritical impregnation of polylactic acid (PLA) filaments with an OLE for later use in a 3D printer. The effect of printing temperature (200, 210, and 220 ºC) and printing speed (40, 50, and 60 mm/s) was studied, using the antioxidant activity of the generated devices as a response variable. The results showed that both parameters were statistically significant and negative, an increase in these factors led to a decrease in antioxidant activity.