Evaluation of 3D printed PEEK and other 3D printed biocompatible materials as healthcare devices

Abstract

Introduction and Aim: Additive manufacturing has sought a widespread attention and higher rate of development which can also be modeled by processing of the data acquired by medical Computer Tomography scan. The object is built on a built plate of the printer in layers to form a final required model. Thus, a patient-specific model can be created from imaging data set. Materials available for such printing are elastomers, polymers, metals, or ceramics. The polymer, Polyether ether ketone (PEEK) has been used in health care applications, such as medical devices, and implants due to its high strength, biocompatibility, and light weight. Stainless steel (316L) is commonly used due to its strength, bio-tolerance, corrosion resistance and its formability. The aim of this study was to compare the mechanical strength and biocompatibility of medical grade PEEK and stainless steel.   Material and Methods: The test sample of PEEK was prepared using unreinforced PEEK (450G-Victrex Plc., Lancashire, UK) at the Prototyping Lab with a 3D-Printer - INTAMSYS - FUNMAT HT. Samples of stainless steel was printed using the iFusion SF1 Metal 3D Printer using Powder Bed Fusion (PBF) technology. The mechanical tests such as compressive, impact, and tensile tests were performed using an electromechanical universal testing machine (UTM) model- Zwick/Roell Z020 with a 20kN load cell. Biocompatibility tests were done using L929 cells to assess the cytotoxicity of the dental materials.   Results: The tensile strength of PEEK polymer was 70+1.6 and the impact strength of PEEK polymer was 289 J/m.   Conclusion: The tensile strength of stainless steel was higher compared to that of PEEK polymer, and the impact strength of PEEK polymer higher compared to stainless steel. Thus, it can be concluded that both biomaterial such as 316L stainless steel and PEEK are non-toxic to fibroblast.