3d Printing Is The Printing Of Tissues Themselves

As 3D printing transitions from commercial manufacturing use to personal private use individuals will have the ability to print any design. Products can range from a pair of shoes to complicated engineering designs, life-saving devices, prosthetic limbs and weapons that pass airport security. In the future we will likely see printable medications and

The field of bioprinting, using 3D printing technology for producing live cells with extreme accuracy, could be the answer to many of the problems we as humans face in the medical field. It could be the end to organ waiting lists and an alternative for organ transplants. In 3D printing technology lies the potential to replace the testing of new drugs on animals. However, the idea of applying 3 dimensional printing to the health industry is still quite new and yet to have a major impact. Manufacturing working 3D organs remains an enormous challenge, but in theory could solve major issues present today.

The purpose of this experiment is to test how scientists can most efficiently complete organ printing. In this lab, the cells will be suspended in a substrate called sodium alginate-collagen, hydrogel, and other reactants. These materials will react to then embed the cells to their goal location. Then, the cells will be able to be fixated into layers. These layers will then come together and form tissues, which according to biological organization will form organs. The inkjet bioprinter allows for this to occur. Tiny ink droplets form a digital design for the organ printing, and in horizontal sheets, the organ is created tissue by tissue. This lab will test to see which percent concentration of the sodium alginate-collagen composite will prove to be most effective when organ printing. The dependent factor that will determine the conclusion will be the percent of efficiency of cell survival rate. Four trials will be completed in which the same organ is printed and all factors are kept constant, except for the percent concentration of the substrate.

Cornell’s Lawrence Bonassar used 3D photos of human ears to create ear molds. These molds were then filled with a gel containing bovine cartilage cells suspended in collagen, which held the shape of the ear while cells grew their extracellular matrix. Bonassar and his team have since gone on to 3D print intervertebral discs to treat major spinal complications, while researchers at Princeton have 3D printed their own collagen ear, this time, with built-in electronic components for superhuman hearing.

The development of 3D printing has greatly impacted the medical field, more specifically knee replacements. With the new development of 3D printing, patients have experienced a shorter recovery time, less pain, and more mobility.

The BioPen allows surgeons to repair damaged bone and cartilage by “drawing” new cells directly onto bone in the middle of surgery. The pen has a bio-ink comprised of stem cells inside a biopolymer such as alginate (a seaweed extract) which is in turn protected by a second layer of hydrogel. Once on the bone surface, the ink is hardened using a UV light embedded in the pen. Once they are drawn onto the bone, they will proliferate in the patient’s body, differentiating into nerve, muscle and bone cells and eventually being established as tissue. The technique could reform how surgeons repair cartilage. For certain types of injuries, it’s difficult for surgeons to discern the exact shape of the area requiring an implant, making it tricky to design an artificial cartilage implant before surgery. With the BioPen, surgeons could simply use the hydrogel solution to fill in the damaged area. The cell solution could also be further customized by adding drugs to boost healing and regrowth. Hopefully, these type of innovations can change patients from being defined by their pain to being able to live healthier lives.

SINcE I hAVE ALwAYS BEEN INTErESTEd in science and technology, I subscribed to many research magazines, including Popular Science and Scientific American. However, until 10th grade, I never had the opportunity to contribute to medical research—something that I had always wanted to do. Then, one day I read an article titled “Print Me a Pancreas, Please” in Popular Science, which described novel tissue engineering research involving modification of off-the-shelf inkjet printers to print out living cells in a “bioink” solution. Having read much about tissue engineering, I realized this “organ printing” approach could potentially address problems of traditional tissue engineering methods, such as the need to precisely place specific cell types in 3D scaffolds. I was so excited that I came up with a few ideas of my own about advancing the

Bioprinting offers the ability to create a 3D biomimetic tissue by patterning cells and, in some approaches, multiple cell types with precise and reproducible spatial control. In order to create these organs a researcher must start off with a bioink consisting of compounds with a chemical structure consisting of polysaccharides and/or proteins. Some of the compounds include, but are not limited to agar, collagen, silk, elastin, and chitosan. These bioinks are then infused with additives that include growth factors, cytokines, and extracellular matrix (Bioprinting 4-12). Bioprinting then “moves from the laboratory to the clinic sources, clinical grade cells will be necessary to support the assembly of different constructs” This is where stem cells from the patient, if possible, are utilized to prevent the use of immunosuppressive drugs. (Bioprinting 4-12). Once everything is loaded into the biopen, it is then loaded into the bioprinter (fig 1, 2). Researchers are then able to make tissues, organs, and many other structural components.

3D printing is slowly making its way into the mainstream train of thought. Students at an abundance of universities have access to this incredible innovation. To some this exciting technology seems to be nothing but a fad. However, 3D printing has already began to make significant strides in the medical field. With the right business strategies, we believe that 3D printing will take the medical field to a place we before never saw as possible.

New Medical Research shows that 3-D printing can be used to reproduce human cells by bio-printing blood vessels and human tissue. Medical Research has shown that 3-D printing of the tissue can be a new invasive treatment for individuals that need rapid acting, life-saving treatment and the most cost effective option. There are a variety of different types of 3-D printers. However, with each 3-D printer they each produce their own unique and distinct objects. The usage of each 3-D printer differs from one another. In the terms of bio-printing its provides many benefits such as providing the production of medication, or a tissue. Furthermore 3-D printing can be also used for educational purposes, such as adding 3-D printing to the curriculum

Anthony Atala, in his 2011 Ted Talk, Printing a Human Kidney, tells of printing a bladder. He explains that they use a small piece of the patients original bladder. They then print a scaffold and let the cells grow on the scaffolding in an “oven like device” that has the “same conditions as the human body -- 37 degrees centigrade, 95 percent oxygen” Weeks later, the organ has grown and it is ready to be placed in the patient. Atala explains that “For these specific patients, we actually just suture these materials. We use three-dimensional imagining analysis, but we actually created these biomaterials by hand.”Luke Massella, a patient who received a 3D printed organ because he was born with spina bifida that prevented his bladder and kidneys

One of the newer technologies being developed by biomedical engineers is a 3D bioprinting. A 3D printer is a computer run machine, which has the ability to print out objects layer by

The process of bioprinting is a method in which using three-dimensional (3D) technologies to produce cell-encapsulated hydrogel. An advantage of this process compare to the other conventional fabrication technologies is that the cell distribution inside the scaffold can be controllable[3]. Alginate, as natural polysaccharide was called,

With the very limited supply of organs, 3D printing creates functioning organs without a donation from a living organism. The definition of 3D printing from Charles W. Hull, the inventor of 3D systems, states that “...thin layers of a material that can be cured with ultraviolet light were sequentially printed in layers to form a solid 3D structure” (Murphy & Atala 773). The sheer narrow sheets play a vital role in bioprinting. They allow the printers to develop functional, layering individual cells, proteins, and an extracellular matrix. The three basic types of 3D printing include biomimicry, independent self- assembly, and miniature tissue blocks. The creation of the 3D structure creates all the difference between these types of printing. Three dimensional structure approaches include, creating exact duplicates of the cells and tissues with extensive knowledge, using a developing embryo as a template or using microscopic tissues to assemble into a larger developed tissue (Kalaskar). In other words, all these paths to bioprinting end up with a 3D structure but require different knowledge and materials. They all contain their own sets of challenges.

3D printers are not just meant for fun at the home, but they can save lives. That’s right 3D printers are starting to make their way into the hospitals, to help develop ways they can save lives. “Realistically, we 're going to be living to 100 ...110. With bio-printed organs, living to 110 won 't be anything like living to that age today," contends Jack Uldrich, a technology trend expert. "We 're already printing skin, kidneys, a replica of a beating human heart. If a person loses a limb, we 'll be able to print, layer by layer, a replacement. It 's theoretically possible.”(Federico-O 'Murchu). The average life expectancy is around 80 years old, with the 3D printers they are able to increase the lifespan of a human by almost 150 percent. Regarding the difficulty of creating human body parts varies on which part needs to be produced. Take creating an ear for example, that is much easier than creating a fully function heart. The process which is used to create an ear is slightly different from creating an organ. The labs create the gelatin like cartilage material, they then use a 3D printer to lay the matter out in the shape of an ear. The now 3D object is covered in cells and kept in a temperature controlled room to ensure the cells will spread and become healthy enough to be planted on to the host body. “At the other end of the longevity