Roll-to-roll, high-resolution 3D printing of shape-specific particles

Abstract Particle fabrication has attracted recent attention owing to its diverse applications in bioengineering 1,2 , drug and vaccine delivery 3–5 , microfluidics 6,7 , granular systems 8,9 , self-assembly 5,10,11 , microelectronics 12,13 and abrasives 14 . Herein we introduce a scalable, high-resolution, 3D printing technique for the fabrication of shape-specific particles based on roll-to-roll continuous liquid interface production (r2rCLIP). We demonstrate r2rCLIP using single-digit, micron-resolution optics in combination with a continuous roll of film (in lieu of a static platform), enabling the rapidly permutable fabrication and harvesting of shape-specific particles from a variety of materials and with complex geometries, including geometries not possible to achieve with advanced mould-based techniques. We demonstrate r2rCLIP production of mouldable and non-mouldable shapes with voxel sizes as small as 2.0 × 2.0 µm 2 in the print plane and 1.1 ± 0.3 µm unsupported thickness, at speeds of up to 1,000,000 particles per day. Such microscopic particles with permutable, intricate designs enable direct integration within biomedical, analytical and advanced materials applications.