Tag Archives: bioprinting
Video: How 3D Printing Will Change the World and Industry Interviews
In the PBS video below, the 3D printing industry is profiled.
3D Printing is heralded as a revolutionary and disruptive technology, but how will these printers truly affect our society? Beyond an initial novelty, 3D Printing could have a game-changing impact on consumer culture, copyright and patent law, and even the very concept of scarcity on which our economy is based. From at-home repairs to new businesses, from medical to ecological developments, 3D Printing has an undeniably wide range of possibilities which could profoundly change our world.
The video includes interviews with:
- Sam Cervantes from Solidoodle on innovation
- Carine Carmy from Shapeways on supply chain disruption
- Michael Weinberg from Public Knowledge on copyright and IP
- Joseph Flaherty from Wired.com on bioprinting and more
Watch the full video below.
Top 10 Countdown: Most Popular 3D Printing Stories in February 2013
Here are the top 10 most popular stories On 3D Printing brought you in February 2013.
10. 3D Printing Retail Store Hosts Open House in Denver, CO
9. Make: Where Do We Really Stand On 3D Printing?
8. Cornell Professor Develops Technique for 3D Printing a Human Ear
7. Details on the 3D Printing Institute from Obama’s SOTU Address
6. Accused of Stealing, 3D Printing Design Marketplace 3DLT Apologizes
5. NPR Discusses 3D Printed Guns on Morning Edition
4. Biofabrication: Scientists 3D Print Stem Cells to Create Human Organs
3. Video: The Best 7 TED Talks On 3D Printing
2. Must-See Infographic: How 3D Printing Will Revolutionize the Classroom
1. President Obama Calls 3D Printing “Revolutionary” in State of the Union
Thanks for reading in February!
Cornell Professor Develops Technique for 3D Printing a Human Ear
3D printing organs and stem cells is currently being researched and may become a reality someday. What about 3D printing an ear using material to synthesize human cartilage?
Lawrence Bonassar, associate professor of biomedical engineering at Cornell University, has been working to solve this problem by developing a “living ink” that can be used to 3D print the cartilage for a human ear. His research was published in the journal PLoS One and featured on NPR.
“The ear is really remarkable from a mechanical perspective,” says Lawrence Bonassar, an associate professor of biomedical engineering at Cornell University who has been working with a group to develop a better replacement ear.
To make the ear, Bonassar and his colleagues scanned the ears of his twin daughters, who were 5 at the time. They used a 3-D printer to build a plastic mold based on the scan. Those printers, similar to a home inkjet, lately have also been adapted to experiment with making chocolate, guns, and even kidneys.
They then injected a soup of collagen, living cartilage cells, and culture medium. The soup congeals “like Jell-O,” Bonassar tells Shots. “All this happens quickly. You inject the mold, and in 15 minutes you have an ear ready to go.”
Well, not exactly. What they have is an ear-shaped chunk of cells that would have to be tucked under the skin on the side of the head by a plastic surgeon before it could become an ear.
To test whether their ear-mold would become living, useful ear cartilage, the researchers implanted samples under the skin on the back of laboratory rats. In three months, cartilage cells took over the collagen, making for a solid-yet-flexible chunk of cartilage that retained its precise shape and size.
Bonassar thinks this technology can be used in humans in 5 years, with any luck.
Below is a video featuring this amazing research.
Via NPR.
Top 3D Printing Headlines Last Week: Retail, Stem Cells, Piracy, NPR
A roundup of the top news On 3D Printing brought you from February 5 to February 10:
Tuesday, February 5
Wednesday, February 6
Sunday, February 10
- 3D Printing Retail Store Hosts Open House in Denver, CO
- Fab Lab of the Week: Westport, CT Library’s MakerSpace 3D Printing
Image credit: ESA.
Biofabrication: Scientists 3D Print Stem Cells to Create Human Organs
Scientists from Heriot Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland, have developed a technique for 3D printing human embryonic stem cells (hESCs), claiming that this research could be advanced to eventually 3D print human organs. In the short-term, this technique could be used for more reliable drug testing.
Dr Will Shu, from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, told BBC: “We found that the valve-based printing is gentle enough to maintain high stem cell viability, accurate enough to produce spheroids of uniform size, and most importantly, the printed hESCs maintained their pluripotency – the ability to differentiate into any other cell type.”
Here is a video from Sky News featuring the Edinburgh lab and an interview with Dr. Will Shu.
The team’s research has been published in the journal Biofabrication.
More from BBC:
Jason King, business development manager of stem cell biotech company Roslin Cellab, which took part in the research, said: “Normally laboratory grown cells grow in 2D but some cell types have been printed in 3D.
“However, up to now, human stem cell cultures have been too sensitive to manipulate in this way.
“This is a scientific development which we hope and believe will have immensely valuable long-term implications for reliable, animal-free, drug testing, and, in the longer term, to provide organs for transplant on demand, without the need for donation and without the problems of immune suppression and potential organ rejection.”
