Hello Giuseppe,

I have some 6+ years experience with the Dimatix DMP-2800 series inkjet with both solvent based and water based carrier liquids. The surface tension and viscosity range mentioned by Dimatix should be taken as directional.

Your question can be split into two subquestions: runnability and wetting properties.

Runnability concerns the ink's ability to remain printable through out the day. This will place some requirements on the carrier liquid: you need a humectant and/or lubricant to prevent inkjet nozzles from clogging. With wisely chosen lubricant and humectant your ink will not dry out and clogg the nozzles. They will also provide the neccessary viscolelastic properties for the ink to become easily jettable (tail ligament formation, no droplet bursting). From here on the wetting properties of the ink will dictate, how well the ink will set on your subtrate (marangoni effect --> coffee stain, spreading, ...).

I've heard of a few cases, bioinks, where plain water was used as an ink carrier liquid. However, this was not done on a Dimatix but on affordable, moded consumer grade inkjets (hp, canon, epson) that are more forgiving in terms of runnability in comaprison to the Dimatix.

Dimitar,

Thanks a lot for the provided answer.

I have not tried to print DI water itself but water based buffers such as PBS and printing was successfull although not that straightforward. I now would like to try out some buffers with less amount of ions in solution, such as phosphate buffers. 

Giuseppe,

good luck with your experiments! The spray coating and air brush technique will also provide you with the atomization of your liquid, without the constituents like humectants and lubricants you might want to get rid of later.

Dimitar,

Thank you again for the answer. In my experiments, I should use a minimum quantity (if not even nothing at all) of humectants and lubricants.

Check this paper