Dr Swee Leong SING is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Mechanical Engineering, National University of Singapore (NUS), Singapore. Prior to joining NUS, he was a Presidential Postdoctoral Fellow at the Singapore Centre for 3D Printing and School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore after receiving the prestigious fellowship in 2020. His research interest is enabling material development, creating strategic and sustainable values for Industry 4.0 and beyond through the use and integration of advanced manufacturing. Swee Leong is named a Highly Cited Researcher by Clarivate in 2022 and 2023. In 2022, Swee Leong is also awarded the Young Professional Award by ASTM International. As of December 2023, he has co-authored 64 peer reviewed articles in the field of additive manufacturing or 3D printing. He currently has a h-index of 35, with more than 6500 citations based on statistics from Web of Science. Swee Leong is also the co-inventor for three patents in additive manufacturing related processes and materials.

Topic title:

Complex Structures Enabled by Additive Manufacturing for Biomedical Applications

Abstract:

Additive manufacturing (AM), or more commonly known as 3D printing, has enabled the development of complex structures with unique properties which make them especially valuable in the medical industry for applications in biomedical implants.

Typically, these structures are designed in computer aided design (CAD) software using repeating units and then fabricated using AM. However, in recent years, there has been a new method of creating such structures, by means of generative design (GD) which makes use of algorithms in the form of code to formalise a designer’s idea. The advantage of GD lies with the fact that it is a versatile method and it can save on the time required to redesign products as the parameters of a particular product can be altered by modifying the input code. Additionally, because of this, the product with the most optimal design can be selected quickly which further saves on production time and costs.

In literature reviewed, complex structures have been successfully used in biomedical implants, but there has yet to be a study conducted with regards to the application of complex structures generated by GD in biomedical implants. In this talk, we intends to bridge the gap identified in literature by analysing the mechanical properties, of six gyroid samples of different porosities that are designed using GD in order to evaluate whether complex structures created by GD is viable for use in biomedical implant applications.

The results obtained from mechanical testing indicate that gyroid structures with a porosity ranging from 60% to 70% generated by means of GD have great potential for applications in biomedical implants. This is because the stiffness of these structures match that of human trabecular bone, which would mean that the effects of stress-shielding is minimised. Areas that future research could focus on would be to study the efficiency of these structures pertaining to cell growth and osseointegration.