Printing Paradigms

This chapter introduces the invention of 3D printing in the mid-1980s and discusses how bioprinting emerged from that technology some 15 years later, the significantly more formidable requirements that bioprinting presents compared to 3D printing, and the scientists who were the trailblazers of bioprinting. Mention is made of several medical successes of 3D printing prior to the advent of bioprinting. The chapter describes three of the principal bioprinting techniques and the steps that comprise the fundamental process regardless of the specific technique employed. It provides an introduction to some of the basic lexicon of bioprinting—words such as bioinks, bioreactors, extracellular matrices, rheology, and scaffolds. The chapter acquaints the reader with new and novel developments such as the Kenzan method style of bioprinting as well as the innovation of rotational 3D printing and its possible use in bioprinting.