Advantage of Alginate Bioinks in Biofabrication for Various Tissue Engineering Applications

Abstract

Bioprinting is fast emerging as a viable technique for organ fabrication. Though various types of bioprinting methods have been developed, the most commonly used bioprinting is extrusion-based bioprinting (EBB). Bioinks are extruded layer-by-layer forming a 3D multicellular construct and scaled up to dimensions depending upon the specific tissue to be regenerated. Among various bioinks, alginate, a natural polysaccharide, has been extensively used because of its good printability in physiologically amenable conditions. Though alginate possesses good printability properties, it promotes little cell–material interaction resulting in limited biofunctionality. Therefore, it becomes necessary to blend/modify alginate to improve the biological properties of bioink without compromising printability. This paper presents a review of the various approaches used to optimize bioprinting with alginate bioinks and their limitations.