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PRiME Connaught Global Speaker Series – July 11, 2024
Session Description
July 11 2024 @ 11:00 am - 12:00 pm
Speaker:
Dr. Jean-Christophe Leroux
Full Professor at the Department of Chemistry and Applied Biosciences
Deputy Head of Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, ETH Zürich
Date: Thursday, July 11, 2024, 11:00AM - 12:00PM (Refreshments will be provided)
Location: Red Seminar Room, Terrence Donnelly Centre, 160 College Street
Title: 3D Printing of Drug Eluting Polymeric Medical Devices
Three-dimensional (3D) printing is a versatile technology enabling the cost-effectiveproduction of personalized medical devices. Among various 3D printing methods,digital light processing (DLP) stands out for its ability to rapidly createobjects with high precision. However, the fabrication of bioresorbable medicaldevices using DLP is in part limited by the limited choice of suitablebiomedical inks. In this study, we developed innovative polyester-based inksenabling DLP printing of therapeutic devices with adjustable mechanicalcharacteristics and degradation profiles. The most promising materials wereutilized to design biodegradable customized airway stents. These stentsdegraded into soft hydrogels in vitro and completely disappeared seven weeksafter insertion in rabbits. Additionally, the 3D printed stents could be loadedwith drugs like levofloxacin or nintedanib, and their release kinetics could betailored by modifying the copolymer composition. Furthermore, we engineerednear-infrared (NIR) light-responsive stents containing gold nanorods usingtunable ink compositions. This allowed for the creation of shape-memory stentsthat expand upon NIR light activation, facilitating easy deployment. Lastly,DLP served as a prototyping method for the fabrication and optimization ofmucosal suction patches investigated for transbuccal drug delivery. Thesestudies open new perspectives for the rapid manufacturing of complex deviceswith superior properties.
About Dr. Jean-Christophe Leroux
Jean-Christophe Leroux is a full professor of Drug Formulation and Delivery atthe Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the ETH Zurich, Switzerland. He hasmade important fundamental and applied contributions to the fields ofbiomaterials and drug delivery and has been involved in the development ofinnovative bio-detoxification systems for the treatment of metabolitedisorders. He is a fellow of the AAPS, EURASC, French Academy of Pharmacy, andthe CRS, and the co-founder of the start-up pharmaceutical companies VersantisAG, Inositec AG and OBaris AG.
