Growth of yttria-stabilized zirconia with 3D printer

• Autor(a) principal: Gaspar, Ana Margarida Martins
• Data de Publicação: 2016
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10362/88345
• topic: 3YSZ pastes; 3D printing; mechanical resistance; sintering; morphology; biocompatibility; Domínio/Área Científica::Engenharia e Tecnologia::Engenharia dos Materiais

3D printing manufacturing is being widely applied in several areas, including medicine that may be the one with the most promising future. The main advantage of this technology comparing to conventional ones is the possibility to create customizable bioprints for biomedical applications. In this thesis, the 3D printing conditions of ceramic samples made of 3% mol yttria-stabilized zirconia were studied and optimized. Initially, several pastes were tested in order to choose the one with the best printability, wish resulted in one with binder and another without. Also, geometry studies were per-formed to achieve samples with optimized mechanical properties. The printed samples were sintered and characterized to understand how the geometry and the sintering temperature influence the mechan-ical properties. The morphology was observed using optical and electronic microscopy, and the apparent density obtained by Archimedes method. The degradability and biocompatibility of samples were also tested. The results show that the 3D printed ceramic pieces have compression strength, Young’s modulus and porosity comparable to the ones found in literature for human bones confirming its viability for biomed-ical applications. Tests demonstrate that the samples do not degrade in contact with simulated body fluids, and biological assays confirms its biocompatibility and cells proliferation.