A Case Study of 3D Printed PLA and Its Mechanical Properties

In this modern manufacturing scenario cost effectiveness and environment friendly design of a production process plays a vital role. This article focuses towards the newer manufacturing technique 3D Printing (3DP) and its feasibility to implementation towards biomedical components. 3DP is technology which can create complex geometry into a solid model. This solid model is made up Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) method which is a type of rapid prototyping method. In this study Poly Lactic Acid (PLA) is considered as an alternate to the existing material. PLA is a biodegradable polymer which possesses good strength and biodegradable property which is highly needed in production of newer components through 3DP. The study begins with creation of solid 3D model based on the ASTM standards to test the strength of the material using micro tensile testing and biodegradable test of component using landfill method. The results clearly shows that the strength of the test specimen is strongly satisfies which can be further used as any biomedical component as well as the land fill test of the specimen over a period of 30 days to 60 days shows good amount of weight reduction which is also a fine outcome of this research work. Another way to degrade PLA by using bacterial degradation such as Amycolatopsis coloradensis are able to degrade PLA. A purified protease from amycolatopsis sp., PLA depolymerise, can also degrade PLA. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Selection and/or Peer-review under responsibility of International Conference on Materials Manufacturing and Modelling (ICMMM - 2017).