bio printer
Latest
Researchers tout progress with 'skin printers,' hope to one day treat battlefield wounds
We've already seen that living tissue can be printed using what amounts to a bio-inkjet printer, and some researchers from the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine now say they've made some considerable progress that could bring the technology one step closer to use on the battlefield. Specifically, they've been able to speed up the healing of wounds on mice using a "printed" swath of tissue and completely heal the wound in three weeks, whereas an untreated wound did not heal itself in the same time period. Of course, there's no word on any plans for tests on humans just yet, but the researchers do plan to take one more step in that direction by moving on to tests on pigs next.
Invetech 3D bio-printer is ready for production, promises 'tissue on demand'
Say hello to "the world's first production model 3D bio-printer." What you're looking at is a machine capable of arranging human cells and artificial scaffolds into complex three-dimensional structures, which result in such wonderful things as replacement liver and kidney tissue, or such simple niceties as artificially grown teeth. All we're told of the internal workings is that the bio-printer utilizes laser-calibrated print heads and that its design is the first to offer sufficiently wide flexibility of use to make the device viable. Organovo will be the company responsible for promoting the new hardware to research institutions, while at the same time trying to convince the world that it's not the fifth sign of the apocalypse. Maybe if the printer didn't have a menacing red button attached to it, we'd all be a little less freaked out by it.
