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| Fabrication technique | Advantages | Disadvantages |
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| Conventional fabrication techniques | 1. Freeze-drying | 1. Use in a variety of purposes
2. Capability of obviating high temperatures
3. The pore size is manageable to be controlled by changing the freezing method [20] | 1. High energy consumption
2. Long-term timescale
3. The use of cytotoxic solvents
4. The generation of small
5. Irregular size pores (usually in the range of 15 to 35 μm) |
| 2. Solvent casting and practical leaching | 1. Fits thin membranes of thin wall three-dimensional specimens
2. High porosity (50–90%)
3. Lost cost technique | 1. Time consuming since thin membranes are only used
2. The widespread use of very toxic solvents |
| 3. Gas foaming | 1. Porosity up to 85% | 1. If the fabrication process did not change, the product obtained might have a closed pore structure or a solid polymeric skin |
| 4. Electrospinning | 1. Essential technique for developing nanofibrous scaffolds for the TE
2. Homogeneous mixture made of fibers with high tensile strength | 1. Used solvents can be toxic
2. Problematic to obtain 3D structures as well as sufficient size of pores needed for biomedical applications
3. Process depends on many variables |
| 5. Thermal-induced phase separation | 1. Construction of the thermoplastic crystalline polymer scaffold
2. Low temperature can be utilized for the integration of bioactive molecules
3. The porosity of fibers is more than 98% a higher surface-to-volume ratio than those constructed | Only used for thermoplastic |
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| Rapid prototyping (RP) | 1. Stereolithography (SLA) | 1. Enables to overcome the challenges related to wastage in subtractive fabrication methods
2. High resolution
3. Uniformity in pores interconnectivity | 1. Has limitations in the process of photopolymerization
2. Requiring massive amounts of monomers and postpolymerization treatment to improve monomer conversion |
| 2. Selective laser sintering (SLS) | 1. Using ultrahigh-molecular-weight polyethylene
2. Provides user excellent control over the microstructures of the produced scaffold by an adapting SLS process parameters
3. Utilized to obtain the preferred properties of the created scaffold | 1. Steps after processing the spin of the phase are required to remove injected powder
2. High operating temperature |
| 3. Solvent-based extrusion freeforming (SEF) | 1. It can be utilized to make ceramic, metal, and metal/ceramic composite part
2. It can directly or indirectly function in printing the actual part or a mould
3. It is a new fabrication method for tissue engineering that can be utilized for precise control of scaffold structure at the micron level
4. Success involves the ability to strictly follow the structure of the natural tissue and the mechanical characteristics of the scaffold | 1. Temperature extrusion. Their design includes a change to the factors affecting extrusion pressure, including nozzle length-to-diameter ratio, a paste formulation, and the extrusion velocity |
| 4. Bioprinting | 1. Low costs
2. Higher accuracy and greater shape complexity
3. The high speed of printing with the capability of supporting parallel high cell viability (80/90%) | Depends on existence of cells |
| 5. Fused deposition modeling (FDM) | 1. Useful in the scaffold design under the different aspect of scaffold fabrication. Low-temperature deposition | Has limitations in its application to biodegradable polymers [13] |
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