Computed Tomography-Driven Design and Fused Filament Fabrication of Graded Density Bone Scaffolds

Featured Application: The work finds potential application in the design and manufacture of patient-specific scaffolds in the biomedical field using desktop MEX AM technologies. The design of scaffolds and prostheses benefits from the opportunities provided by additive manufacturing technologies. Specifically, scaffold design using cellular structures based on lattices has become a significant focus. These lattice-based scaffolds exhibit intricate and complex shapes with controlled macro-porosity. In this study, a method is presented that enables the modeling of a graded-density lattice structure for material extrusion additive manufacturing, without relying on a geometric lattice model. The methodology utilizes computed tomography (CT) scans as inputs to obtaining a 3D scalar field and a surface model. The lattice structure is designed and generated within the computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) software, ensuring consistent machine toolpaths. The 3D scalar field, representing a relative density map derived from CT Hounsfield units, drives the variation of the extrusion parameters generated by the CAM, achieving a graded-density lattice. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the method, a section of a human femur bone with a lattice with a triply periodic minimal surface (TPMS) gyroid pattern was designed and 3D-printed, replicating the relative density of the target tissue.