Urethane dimethacrylate-based photopolymerizable resins for stereolithography 3D printing: a physicochemical characterisation and biocompatibility evaluation

Vat photopolymerisation (VP) three-dimensional printing (3DP) has attracted great attention in many different fields, such as electronics, pharmaceuticals, biomedical devices and tissue engineering. Due to the low availability of biocompatible photocurable resins, its application in the healthcare sector is still limited. In this work, we formulate photocurable resins based on urethane dimethacrylate (UDMA) combined with three different difunctional methacrylic diluents named ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EGDMA), di(ethylene glycol) dimethacrylate (DEGDMA) or tri(ethylene glycol) dimethacrylate (TEGDMA). The resins were tested for viscosity, thermal behaviour and printability. After printing, the 3D printed specimens were measured with a digital calliper in order to investigate their accuracy to the digital model and tested with FT-IR, TGA and DSC. Their mechanical properties, contact angle, water sorption and biocompatibility were also evaluated. The photopolymerizable formulations investigated in this work achieved promising properties so as to be suitable for tissue engineering and other biomedical applications.