Established in 2006, TATA Africa Services (Nigeria) Limited operates as the nodal point for Tata businesses in West Africa. TATA Africa Services (Nigeria) Limited has a strong presence in Nigeria with investments exceeding USD 10 million. The company was established in Lagos, Nigeria as a subsidiary of TATA Africa Holdings (SA) (Pty) Limited, South Africa and serves as the hub of Tata’s operations in Nigeria and the rest of West Africa.

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Three-dimensional bioprinting uses additive manufacturing techniques for the automated fabrication of hierarchically organized living constructs. The building blocks are often hydrogel-based bioinks, which need to be printed into structures with high shape fidelity to the intended computer-aided design. For optimal cell performance, relatively soft and printable inks are preferred, although these undergo significant deformation during the printing process, which may impair shape fidelity. While the concept of good or poor printability seems rather intuitive, its quantitative definition lacks consensus and depends on multiple rheological and chemical parameters of the ink. This review discusses qualitative and quantitative methodologies to evaluate printability of bioinks for extrusion- and lithography-based bioprinting. The physicochemical parameters influencing shape fidelity are discussed, together with their importance in establishing new models, predictive tools and printing methods that are deemed instrumental for the design of next-generation bioinks, and for reproducible comparison of their structural performance.

Printability and Shape Fidelity of Bioinks in 3D Bioprinting.

Utilization of polymers as biomaterials has greatly impacted the advancement of modern medicine. Specifically, polymeric biomaterials that are biodegradable provide the significant advantage of being able to be broken down and removed after they have served their function. Applications are wide ranging with degradable polymers being used clinically as surgical sutures and implants. To fit functional demand, materials with desired physical, chemical, biological, biomechanical, and degradation properties must be selected. Fortunately, a wide range of natural and synthetic degradable polymers has been investigated for biomedical applications with novel materials constantly being developed to meet new challenges. This review summarizes the most recent advances in the field over the past 4 years, specifically highlighting new and interesting discoveries in tissue engineering and drug delivery applications.

Biomedical applications of biodegradable polymers

Fused deposition modeling-based additive manufacturing (3D printing): techniques for polymer material systems

Current advances and future perspectives of 3D printing natural-derived biopolymers.

The emergence of 3D printing technology in the fashion industries has led to a rapidly growing attention and discussion on its coming impacts, novel approaches and those relevant challenges involved in its supply chain integration. The purpose of this conceptual study is to examine the potential impacts and challenges of integrating Direct Digital Manufacturing methods, specifically 3D printing (3DP), in the fashion industry. To recognize and organize such integration, we first examine the nature of Direct digital manufacturing (DDM) in contrast to traditional manufacturing approaches. After that, a conceptual model applied to DDM integrated fashion industry was then proposed to address this change. With respect to 3DP, four areas of its direct and indirect impacts were prudently examined, which were primarily put on (1) design and product development, (2) sourcing and manufacturing, (3) retail, distribution and consumer, as well as (4) the sustainability optimization. The potential challenges of integrating 3DP, which ultimately leads to the DDM paradigm, in each of these areas were also evaluated. Beyond the identified impacts and challenges, this proposed conceptual model ultimately aims to help lay the groundwork, explore future research topics and curricula for the fashion field integrating DDM, focusing on the 3DP technology.

/pdf/envisioning-the-era-of-3d-printing-a-conceptual-model-for-2bnswnjtrb.pdf

Envisioning the era of 3D printing: a conceptual model for the fashion industry

As direct digital manufacturing, 3D printing (3DP) technology provides new development directions and opportunities for the high-value utilization of a wide range of biological materials. Cellulose nanofibrils (CNF) and polylactic acid (PLA) biocomposite filaments for fused deposition modeling (FDM) 3DP were developed in this study. Firstly, CNF was isolated by enzymatic hydrolysis combined with high-pressure homogenization. CNF/PLA filaments were then prepared by melt-extrusion of PLA as the matrix and CNF as the filler. Thermal stability, mechanical performance, and water absorption property of biocomposite filaments and 3D-printed objects were analyzed. Findings showed that CNF increased the thermal stability of the PLA/PEG600/CNF composite. Compared to unfilled PLA FDM filaments, the CNF filled PLA biocomposite filament showed an increase of 33% in tensile strength and 19% in elongation at break, suggesting better compatibility for desktop FDM 3DP. This study provided a new potential for the high-value utilization of CNF in 3DP in consumer product applications.

https://www.mdpi.com/1420-3049/25/10/2319/pdf

Cellulose Nanofibrils Filled Poly(Lactic Acid) Biocomposite Filament for FDM 3D Printing

Digital technologies are becoming an integral part of today’s fashion industry and starting to disrupt many traditional approaches and leading to a paradigm shift. Consequentially, technology has d...

Technology disruptions: exploring the changing roles of designers, makers, and users in the fashion industry

Biodiesel is a renewable fuel that can be produced from a range of organic and renewable feedstock including fresh or vegetable oils, animal fats, and oilseed plants. In recent years, the lignin-based aromatic wastes, such as various aromatic waste polymers from agriculture, or organic dye wastewater from textile industry, have attracted much attention in academia, which can be uniquely selected as a potential renewable feedstock for biodiesel product converted by yeast cell factory technology. This current investigation indicated that the highest percentage of lipid accumulation can be achieved as high as 47.25% by an oleaginous yeast strain, Meyerozyma caribbica SSA1654, isolated from a wood-feeding termite gut system, where its synthetic oil conversion ability can reach up to 0.08 (g/l/h) and the fatty acid composition in yeast cells represents over 95% of total fatty acids that are similar to that of vegetable oils. Clearly, the use of oleaginous yeasts, isolated from wood-feeding termites, for synthesizing lipids from aromatics is a clean, efficient, and competitive path to achieve "a sustainable development" towards biodiesel production. However, the lacking of potent oleaginous yeasts to transform lipids from various aromatics, and an unknown metabolic regulation mechanism presented in the natural oleaginous yeast cells are the fundamental challenge we have to face for a potential cell factory development. Under this scope, this review has proposed a novel concept and approach strategy in utilization of oleaginous yeasts as the cell factory to convert aromatic wastes to lipids as the substrate for biodiesel transformation. Therefore, screening robust oleaginous yeast strain(s) from wood-feeding termite gut system with a set of the desirable specific tolerance characteristics is essential. In addition, to reconstruct a desirable metabolic pathway/network to maximize the lipid transformation and accumulation rate from the aromatic wastes with the applications of various "omics" technologies or a synthetic biology approach, where the work agenda will also include to analyze the genome characteristics, to develop a new base mutation gene editing technology, as well as to clarify the influence of the insertion position of aromatic compounds and other biosynthetic pathways in the industrial chassis genome on the expressional level and genome stability. With these unique designs running with a set of the advanced biotech approaches, a novel metabolic pathway using robust oleaginous yeast developed as a cell factory concept can be potentially constructed, integrated and optimized, suggesting that the hypothesis we proposed in utilizing aromatic wastes as a feedstock towards biodiesel product is technically promising and potentially applicable in the near future. 

/pdf/could-termites-be-hiding-a-goldmine-of-obscure-yet-promising-3cbgsqcc.pdf

Could termites be hiding a goldmine of obscure yet promising yeasts for energy crisis solutions based on aromatic wastes? A critical state-of-the-art review

Lushan Sun

Papers

Current advances and future perspectives of 3D printing natural-derived biopolymers.

Envisioning the era of 3D printing: a conceptual model for the fashion industry

Cellulose Nanofibrils Filled Poly(Lactic Acid) Biocomposite Filament for FDM 3D Printing

Technology disruptions: exploring the changing roles of designers, makers, and users in the fashion industry

Could termites be hiding a goldmine of obscure yet promising yeasts for energy crisis solutions based on aromatic wastes? A critical state-of-the-art review