Scientists at the Universidad Carlos III de Madrid recently presented a prototype for a 3D printer that has the ability to print human skin.
The skin that the printer is able to make is totally functional and is adequate for the use of transplants in patients or to use for testing of chemical, cosmetic, or pharmaceutical products. The scientists worked along with the firm BioDan Group in order to create the 3D printer and it's ready to make fully functional human skin. Their research has been published in the journal Biofabrication and the team excitedly demonstrated the first time that a 3D printer has been used in order to produce functioning human skin.
The skin can be used in a number of settings, many of them in valuable business settings in order to test for things like chemical products, new cosmetics, and more. This human skin that they have created is one of the first living human organs to be created using the 3D printing method.
Their printer is able to replicate the natural structure of human skin and is put together with the use of bioinks; key to 3D bioprinting.
Other research involving 3D printers and scientists from Wake Forest University in North Carolina, have previously been able to create human muscles, bones, and tissues that could be used in order to replace real tissues.
Their work has been published in the journal Nature Biotechnology.
In the past we have also seen 3D printers used by scientists in order to print blood vessels, ears, muscles, and bones. Scientists have been able to do this by replacing the ink that is in traditional printers, with living cells (bioink). They have crafted modified printer cartridges and use extracted cells.
This technology could potentially be used to help save thousands of lives if its successful.
We've certainly come a long way from the first objects we saw 3D printers put out which were basic items like spoons and hammers etc, now we are printing usable human tissue, bones, and organs. There is a lot of room for the 3D printing technology to grow in the health space, and it's also growing in the culinary world and other business areas as well. The potential of the 3D printer technology appears to be rather limitless in what it might be able to help us create.
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Sources:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/01/170123090630.htm
https://qz.com/616185/this-3d-printer-creates-human-muscles-and-tissues-that-could-actually-replace-real-ones/
nature.com/articles/doi:10.1038/nbt.3413
https://sputniknews.com/us/201603101036062940-3d-printing-organs/