US materials company FibreTuff recently announced the opening of a new facility to meet the needs of its self-developed PAPC 3D printed wire. PAPC is a medical grade 3D printed wire that is a polyamide (PA), polyolefin and cellulose. Composite material, which can be used to manufacture Class I and Class II medical devices, such as prosthetic components and orthopedic rehabilitation aids, and to manufacture some orthopedic implants.
Manufacturing implants with conformal sensors or potential applications
FibreTuff developed PAPC 3D printed wire in 2017. In addition to 3D printed wire, FibreTuff also develops 3D printed powder materials and PAPC materials for injection molding. These materials can be used in manufacturing in addition to Class I and Class II medical devices. Class III medical devices such as bone screws, bone plates, spinal cages, gaskets and other orthopedic implants.
Prior to PAPC, a common non-degradable polymer material for orthopedic implants was polyaryletherketone materials, such as PEEK.
PAPC materials have the following characteristics:
Instruments made of PAPC material can be medically examined by X-rays because the material is radiopaque.
According to FibreTuff, PAPC materials have a lower melting point than PEEK, so the price of fused deposition 3D printing equipment for PAPC 3D printing is generally lower than the price of equipment for printing PEEK materials. 3D printing is required for the current three PAPC materials. The temperature is 230 degrees Celsius - 260 degrees Celsius.
Plastics Technology's report indicates that an important feature of PAPC materials is that they are easier to adhere to the coating material, which means that a potential application of PAPC materials is to load the drug on its surface and then implant it into the body to release the drug slowly, or Its surface produces conformal electronic components.
Based on this feature, nScrypt, a US-based company engaged in structural electronic and biological 3D printing, has tried to manufacture electronic structural parts.
nScrypt made a conformal strain gauge on the surface of a 3D printed cylindrical part made from FibreTuff's PAPC material.
The same technology can be applied to 3D printing of PAPC components with sensors or implants. If this technology is used to manufacture medical devices, it can monitor certain health conditions of the human body.
The main reason for FibreTuff's recent expansion into production capacity is that existing medical device OEMs are beginning to use their PAPC materials to manufacture medical devices.