Effect of silver morphology on rheology and photopolymerization characteristics of Silver-Hydroxyapatite slurry for Vat Photopolymerization-based 3D printing process

•Micron-sized silver reduces slurry viscosity by 60% for nano-hydroxyapatite slurry.•Silver flakes increase sintering density of printed structures to 95%, versus 92% for pure hydroxyapatite (HA).•Adding over 5% silver reduces slurry’s cured depth, leading to poor printability.•Potential for biomedical implants with improved strength and antibacterial properties. The present work deals with the processing of HA-silver photocurable slurry to make composites using the Vat-photopolymerization process. Slurries with increasing amount of silver addition in the HA-Ag (0, 5, 10, 15%) slurry have been prepared using monomers with photo-initiators and printed successfully. Silver powder used in this study is in the form of flakes and spheres. A shear thinning behaviour of all the compositions of the slurries has been observed which is essential to fabricate defect-free parts. With increase in silver addition to 15 wt%, the viscosity decreased by around 60 % however curing depth was compromised. From SEM micrographs it was observed that HA with silver flakes showed better sintering with sintering density of 95% compared to only HA and HA with spherical silver samples.