Aerosol Jet Printing in Biotechnologies

Aerosol Jet Printing, AJP, has emerged as a versatile direct ink writing technology enabling high-resolution, non-contact patterning of diverse biomaterials across a broad viscosity range. This capability facilitates the fabrication of complex micro- and mesoscale architectures on planar and non-planar substrates, advancing applications in biosensing, microfluidics, tissue engineering, and drug delivery fields. Herein, we review the integration of this high resolution, rapid prototyping method with bioinks, including proteins, DNA, collagen, gelatin, and silk fibroin, and analyze how processing parameters influence structural and functional outcomes designed for applications for the above mentioned bechnological fields. The ability by aerosol jet printing to combine structural, electrical, and biological functionalities within single platforms supports the development of multifunctional biomedical devices with higher potential with respect to analogies produced using other direct ink writing techniques. While challenges such as bioink stability and process scalability, as well as the lack of deeper analyses about the efficiency of real applicability of aerosol jet printed biotools, still remain open, AJP demonstrates significant promise as an enabling technology for next-generation biofabrication, offering new avenues for personalized and flexible biomedical applications.