Interns are key people for the Biomaterials Team. They gain experience in specific research topics while providing fundamental work on target projects, cooperating with a supervisor and a tutor who address the person to achieve the proposed scientific goals.
For information about currently available internships and possibile collaborations for Master/Bachelor students in the same frame, please use our contact form.
The Master’s degree of Biomaterials is a 3-semester program run by Warsaw University of Technology at the Faculty of Materials Science and Engineering, with an annual intake for students. The second-cycle studies starts in October. The academic path includes a group of mandatory subjects and a group of elective courses.
Second-cycle studies end with the defense of the Master’s thesis, thus obtaining the title of Master of Science in Materials Engineering of the selected specialization.
For more information, you can visit the official page of the Faculty of Materials Science and Engineering.
The first-cycle studies – engineering discipline – last 7 semesters and end with the defense of an engineering diploma thesis. The graduate obtains the title of an engineer in the field of Material Engineering.
Among the subjects led in collaboration with the Biomaterials Group: Mechanics of biomaterials, 3D printing techniques, Research Project – Functional Materials.
For more information, you can visit the official page of the Faculty of Materials Science and Engineering.
Porous materials – also referred to as cellular materials – are a class of materials that contain voids (i.e., pores within their 2D or 3D structures). Porous materials offer unique structural and functional properties compared to their fully dense counterpart.
Stereolithography 3D printers use light-reactive thermoset materials called “resin”. When resins are exposed to certain wavelengths of light, short molecular chains join together, polymerising monomers and oligomers into solidified geometries. This technology allows printing with a resolution of up to 25 microns (compared to the 250 microns of extrusion-based printers, e.g.: FDM).
This project aims to print 3D porous structures with the stereolithography (SLA) technique and to characterise them:
- morphologically (via micro-computed tomography, or micro-CT), to validate the printing process (i.e.: if the designed structure is reproduced with high fidelity);
- mechanically (via compression tests), to characterise their mechanical properties and in particular the absorbed energy (i.e.: area below the stress-strain curve).
CAD files are obtained through the software ANSYS SpaceClaim and are generated using a programming script (written in python language). The generated file will then be exported to .STL extension to be printed.
The samples are obtained by removing from a cubic block a given network of interconnected spheres, to obtain an open-pores structure.
Preliminary results show that with the used material (Formlabs Flexible 80A resin), structures with pore diameter less than 1 mm are not perfectly printed – their internal part stays bulk (non-porous). This might be explained either by the high viscosity of the resin (which influences the post-processing washing in solvent – see additional material) or by its transparent colour, which may reflect the UV rays while printing. More experiments are planned to better characterise the material and the printability of the structure by varying the cube length and pore size.
Additional material:
https://formlabs.com/3d-printers/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=yto
Supervisor: Prof. Wojciech Swieszkowski
Tutor: MSc Eng Pasquale Posabella
Mg and its alloys have been the topic of extensive research for their potential use in biomedical applications over the past few decades. Mg is an attractive material for its potential use in the biomedical field because it has comparable mechanical properties to cortical bone and is a biodegradable metal. This eliminates the need for a second surgery to remove a temporary device after fracture fixation and bone repair, which is essential in the orthopedic field. The degradation performance of Mg is dependent on alloy composition, microstructure, and the medium or environment to which it is exposed. Recently, Mg-Zn-Y alloys with long period stacking ordered (LPSO) phase have demonstrated superior mechanical properties such as high strength and ductility; however, their biocompatibility has not been extensively studied and is poorly understood. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the corrosion resistance of Mg-Zn-Y alloys using in vitro tests and by analyzing the corrosion products using electron microscopy and energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy.
Supervisor: Prof. Wojciech Swieszkowski
Tutor: MSc Diana Martinez
Laboratory work will require optimizing already developed protocols of demineralization and decellularization of bone, cell culture and 3D bioprinting of the developed bioinks.
Supervisor: Joanna Idaszek, PhD Eng
Supervisor: Ewa Kijeńska-Gawrońska, PhD Eng
The main goal of this research will be to develop hydrophobic composite-polymeric surfaces with high water stickiness. The surfaces will be produced using different techniques, including dip coating and melt electrowriting (3D printing) technology. Characterization by the water contact angle, scanning electron microscopy, FTIR, and others.
Supervisor: Prof. Wojciech Swieszkowski
Tutor: MSc David Martinez
For more information, please contact us.