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Category: 3D printing – Page 123

Boston Children’s Hospital uses 3D printing to help baby born with brain outside his skull

3D Printing never ceases to amaze me.

Doctors at Boston Children’s Hospital used a 3D printout of a boy’s skull to prepare for the surgery that saved his life, STAT reports.

Bentley Yoder was born with encephalocele, a rare and often fatal defect in which the skull doesn’t form properly. In Bentley’s case, a significant portion of his brain grew outside of his skull, according to STAT. Despite being told he would not survive, his parents, Dustin and Sierra, continued to seek treatment that would give their son a future, eventually traveling from their home in Ohio to Boston Children’s Hospital.

Aided by 3D models of Bentley’s brain, Dr. John Meara performed the risky surgery on May 24 to save the 7-month-old’s life.

Italian Paleontologist Turns to Materialise to Help 3D Print Trilobite Fossils

Who needs cloning or gene editing; when you have 3D printers.

Although—in the grand scheme of things—3D printing is a relatively new technology in the eyes of humanity, that certainly doesn’t mean that it can’t be used to recreate some of the most ancient artifacts and fossils scattered throughout the Earth. Over the past year, we’ve seen 3D printing technology help recreate the oldest chameleon fossil ever found, as well as a 1220-foot Titanosaur fossil. Even some of the world’s tiniest fossils have been digitally resized and 3D printed so that a paleontologist from the University of Oxford could better examine them. Now, trilobites, which are a group of extinct marine arthropods, are undergoing their own unique form of 3D printed treatment.

Dr. Gianpaolo Di Silvestro, established paleontologist and CEO of the Italian company Trilobite Design Italia, specializes in this group of extinct arthropods, and uses his company to sell both original trilobite fossils and model replicas to collectors, institutions, and museums across the globe. After realizing that a great number of museums were able to provide text information on these fossils, but not a true physical representation, Dr. Di Silvestro decided to provide these museums with palpable trilobite models that would allow visitors to actually hold the ancient past in the palms of their hands. Since traditional fossil casting and modeling proved to be much too costly and time-consuming, Dr. Di Silvestro instead collaborated with Italian architect and 3D designer Francesco Baldassare to work in tandem and design accurate 3D models of trilobites.

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Although a number of 3D printing service bureaus rejected Dr. Di Silvestro’s 3D fossil models due to their design complexity, the Materialise office in Italy rose to the occasion and helped bring these trilobites back to our physical reality. For Dr. Di Silvestro and Baldassare, Materialise’s 3D printing technology has provided them with the ideal solution.

Techshot accomplishes 3D bioprinting in zero gravity

NASA contractor Techshot have become the first to 3D print a heart structure in zero gravity using human stem cells. Together with 3D bioprinter developers nScrypt and bio-ink specialists Bioficial Organs they have successfully printed cardiac and vascular structures, and believe this could further 3D bioprinting efforts on solid ground.

Techshot have been developing technologies for NASA, SpaceX and other partners for more than 25 years. They have tech aboard the International Space Station among other places, and are also known for combining their aerospace specialism with the medical sector, having built the Bone Densitometer zero-gravity X ray machine.

NScrypt are responsible for building the world’s first 3D bioprinter back in 2003, and have been working on micro-dispensing and 3D printing systems for years. Also in the team was Bioficial Organs, which has grown out of the Cardiovascular Innovation Institute in Louisville, Kentucky, and specializes in organ 3D printing innovations.

Miami’s DiAmante produces synthetic diamonds for high-tech applications

Congrats DiAmante! Synthetic Diamond perfection for Quantum Computing and other technologies such as medical technology usage. Synthetic Diamonds (for all you startups or folks looking for something to get into) mass manufacturing is a huge demand area and it is only going to grow in demand with QC and the new medical technologies that are coming over the next 5 to 7 years. I have been researching 3D printers to see what can be done to mimic the process. Suggest HP and Intel to work hard in this space. I did locate one printer so far that is mass producing synthetic diamonds; the quality needs to be improved.

DiAmante makes synthetic diamonds for the semiconductor market.

The founder’s goal: ‘a diamond-based technology revolution’

The tiny company’s competitors include diamond giant DeBeers.

Chinese company prints villa on-site

Amazing; imagine when 4D printing produces building materials that self assemble themselves and with 5D printing the building can monitor the building and repairs itself someday in the future.

Hushang Tengda has 3D printed a 400 square meter luxury villa, on site, in just 45 days.

Construction is a huge deal in the 3D printing world right now and the likes of WinSun have made an impact with the first 3D printed office in Dubai. It also printed a five-storey apartment building and 10 3D printed houses in just 24 hours back in China. This villa is a still a breakthrough though, because it was built on site.

We’re making flat pack houses now

Most 3D printed houses are made in parts at a nearby facility and then transported to the final construction site for assembly, almost like flat pack furniture. It is a massive step forward, but the elephant in the room is still the transport costs. So this new construction is a landmark venture in its own right.

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