A study published in Nature is paving the way for more effective use of biocompatible materials, particularly in restoring cartilage. Cartilage is notoriously difficult to restore, as it requires a balance of mechanical strength and flexibility that are difficult to reproduce.

3D printing technology has been used to print several parts of human body, but it's on call use has never been so fascinating. The new Biopen uses hyrdogel bio-inkto create mid-surgery cartilage implants which yield a cell survival rate of an impressive 97 percent, and further extends the realm of possibility for 3D printing in medicine.

Sweden Team led by Paul Gatenholm at the Wallenberg Wood Science Center has discovered scaffolds to regenerate Cartilages using 3D printed technology. These 3D printed chondrocytes when implanted in living mice, resulted in cartilage production. The team is currently working to explore it's use in human clinical trials.

Scaffolds offer ways to repair damaged tissues and can allow tissue and cartilages to regrow. With Inkjet 3DP and SLS being the commonly used powder-based tools in biomedical engineering applications, recent advances in mass manufacturing are expected to have an impact on fabricate tissues and biological scaffolds. A study published by the National Institute for Materials Science does highlight the significance of this task.

Scientists from Imperial College London and the University of Milano-Bicocca have developed a material that can mimim Cartilage and potentially help it to re-grow. Consisting of silica and a plastic or polymer called polycaprolactone, this Bio-glass has cartilage-like properties including being flexible, strong, durable and resilient and planned for replacing damaged cartilage discs between vertebrae.

American Process Inc. (API), an Atlanta-based company dedicated to the development of renewable biomass materials, has entered into a Joint Development Agreement (JDA) with Swansea University Medical Schoolin Wales to develop 3D printed cartilage to be used for facial reconstruction. Under this JDA, cells will be blended with various formulations of nano-cellulose scaffold material and 3D-printed into tissues for reconstructive surgery.

The Four Universities are working their own way to develop 3D Printing for medical uses and these include Indiana University-layering by applying a viscous bio-ink; Wake Forest University- Integrated Tissue and Organ Printing System (ITOP), which deposits biodegradables to form the tissue's shape, and water-based gels that contain the cells; Pennsylvania State University- artificial cartilage produced by the team is very similar to native cow cartilage and lastly, Advanced Solutions Life Sciences working with capillary beds, which they can flow blood through in the lab.

Dr. Pardraig Strappe, a microbiologist in central Queensland along with a team of researchers at CQUniversity, is using 3D printing, human stem cells, and crocodile cartilage to develop a 3D Printed Joint Cartilage to treat arthritis and joint injuries. The process involves extracting growth factors from crocodile cartilage, removing the proteins that set off a human immune response and adding adult stem cells using CELLINK 3D bioprinter.

Allevi, a Bioprinter Company launched in 2014 has been famous for bioprinters such as Allevi One to Allevi 6, but they are also selling the Ink Kits usable with their printers, aiming at binding customers, getting revenue and building stronger relationship with their customers. After the FRESH Kit, they have launched Coaxial Extrusion Kit, which can create perfusable microchannels with hydrogels and cast endothelial microchannels, thus extending their use in all sorts of tissue types from Cartilage, Skeletal muscle, hearts and tumors.