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3D Printing
10 Surprising Ways 3D Printing Is Being Used Now
By Ariella Brown
While 3D printing has been around for quite some time,
innovative thinkers find new ways to apply it to making the world a better
place -- even off planet.
1.
A new generation of prosthetics
“Turning disabilities into
superpowers” is the defining vision of UK-based Open Bionics.
Their mission is to create “affordable, assistive devices that enhance the
human body.”
Their first product was
the Hero
Arm, which they describe as “the world's first medically certified
3D-printed bionic arm, with multi-grip functionality and empowering
aesthetics.”
It is “a lightweight and
affordable myoelectric prosthesis.”
The
company now offers a selection of themed covers for the Hero Arm, including
Star Wars BB-8, Marvel Iron Man, Disney Frozen and Deus Ex.
They
are “custom-made using innovative
3D-printing and 3D-scanning techniques.”
Dedication
to helping children by providing them with 3D printed hands is also the driving
passion behind a group of volunteers who formed e-NABLE.
Its
members now number in the thousands, and they have made it possible for
thousands of children around the world to regain hand function. See the video
below:
2. Printing skin for the face
This 3D Skin Printer Helps Heal Wounds and Burns explained
how 3D printing can be used to bioprint replacement skin for wound and
burn victims as you can see in the video below.
But
that was demonstrated on an arm, but now the researchers at Wake Forest
Institute for Regenerative Medicine (WFIRM) are developing a way to create a
bioengineered BioMask that could be
applied to people’s faces.
New solutions are necessary
for the skin on the face because existing techniques for grafting skin “can
often lead to scarring, infection or graft failure,” explains the press release.
The BioMask delivers better
results, as shown in the proof-of-concept study
“The mask was created by
using 3-D bioprinting customized with a face
CT image.
Then, wound dressing material
and cell-laden hydrogels were precisely dispensed by the printer and placed in
a layer by layer fashion to create the skin constructs into the mask shape.”
Once the technique is
adopted, it can prove life-changing for people who would otherwise have had to
remain scarred forever.
3. Quick and economical home construction
Another way 3D printing is
being used to make the world a better place is by reducing the cost of home
construction enough to make new houses accessible to those whose income puts adequate
shelter beyond their reach.
One company that has made
this its mission is ICON. Its tagline is “We’re changing the way
people live.”
It set out to apply 3D
printing to houses and envisions whole communities set up that way in a kind of
21st-century version of Levitton.
Last year ICON built
the Chicon house, described as “the first
permitted 3D-printed home built in the United States” in Austin, Texas in 2018.
It took a few weeks to print
“and sparked the imagination of customers, investors, press, and the SXSW
conference community.”
Now it has advanced the
technology to the point where it can get a house up in just a day and at
a cost of just $4000 as you can see in this video:
ICON believes that its 3D
printing applied to concrete is the solution to low-income housing, both in the
USA and abroad.
To that end, it has partnered
with a charity called New Story that has provided funding for homes
in Mexico, Haiti, El Salvador, and Bolivia and for needy households.
“By partnering with ICON in
select regions, New Story will be able to see out their vision more efficiently
and deliver the promise of a life beyond survival to thousands more,” it
reports.
4. Homes on Mars
Applying 3D printing to home
construction also has ramifications for the space program.
In planning a mission to
Mars, NASA has to deal with the challenge of setting up shelter for the people
who will be living on the red planet. To that end, it launched the 3D-Printed Habitat Challenge
See the video below:
5. Plane parts
Airbus adopted 3D printing technology for plane parts a few years
ago.
In 2016 it began using
titanium for engine components, as you can see in this video:
Since then it has extended its use of 3D printing to finish off
its plane interiors with parts made in partnership with a 3D printing company
based in Belgium called Materialise.
“Not only are
3D-printed parts as strong as those made with traditional molding
methods,” Airbus explained, but their reduced weight
offers an advantage for efficiency, and now they are able to produce the parts
with a look that can be “seamlessly integrated” into the decor of the interior
of the plane.
6. Making music
In 2014 a complete band
of 3D-printed instruments, including a drum, keyboard, and guitars, played
together live at Lund University in Sweden.
Lund University professor
Olaf Diegel printed the instrument that were played by students at Lund
University’s Malmö Academy of Music.
Here’s the video of that
event:
7.
Exquisite metal jewelry designs
It was possible to 3D print
jewelry over a decade ago, though those were limited to what could be fashioned
out of plastic.
Now, thanks to advanced
additive manufacturing techniques in metal, it is possible to design and
execute delicate, metal necklaces, earrings, bracelets, rings, etc., as you can
see in the video below:
Using 3D printing for metal can also be
applied to recycling aspects of pieces that are not suited to modern tastes as
explained in this video:
8. 3D printed
eyeglasses
While you can 3D print
individual glasses frames, as you see in the video above, that is not the most
efficient use for the product.
As in other areas of
manufacturing the 3D printing is used for rapid prototyping.
“The ability to have our 3D
printed concept prototypes mimic the exact same color and texture as the
finished product has significantly accelerated the development of new eyeglass
frames,” explained Daniel Tomasin, the Product Sample Coordinator at
Safilo states.
As it eliminates the need to
paint, they are able to create a prototype in ⅕ the time.
As he said, “we can quickly
respond to market trends and reduce our prototyping cycle from 15 hours to just
3 hours.”
Luca Bordin, a 3D Modeling
Specialist at Safilo added, “This arms us to not only dramatically reduce our
turnaround time, but helps improve communication with the designers, enabling
us to achieve the best product possible.”
9. Vegan meat
Whether the interest stems
from concern for health, animal welfare, the environment, or just developing
more economical food choices, lately there’s been increasing interest in developing
vegan alternatives to meat.
And 3D printing is playing a
central role in that.
Giuseppe Scionti, the Italian
founder and CEO of Barcelona-based Nova Meat
has developed a technique to 3D print meat that can duplicate the texture
of beef or poultry using vegetable proteins.
Unlike some other vegan meat
substitutes, it does not have to be reduced to hamburger.
In an interview with Business Insider, Scopto pointed out that he
selects his ingredients with sustainability in mind: "I used raw
materials that don't have a negative impact on the environment," skipping
the things that would have to be imported and so contribute to a “detrimental
impact on the environment."
You can see how the process
works in the video below:
10. This takes the cake
Dinara
Kasko is a young pastry chef from Ukraine. She holds a degree from the
University of Architecture and Design and has experience as an
architect-designer and a 3D visualizer.
She combined that expertise
with her passion for cakes, and that’s how here business with specially shaped
cakes made out of her specially designed molds was born. See the video below:
Ariella Brown
Author
As a
technology writer, Ariella Brown has covered 3D printing, analytics,
big data, bitcoin, cloud computing, green technology, marketing, and social
media. Whether it's a matter of AI, AR, VR, or IoT, she gets beyond the
alphabet soup of acronyms to discover the story of tech applications. Among her
accomplishments is being recognized as one of the 180 leading data
science, big data, and analytics bloggers. She holds a Ph.D. in English
and has taught college-level writing before becoming a full-time writer,
editor, and marketing consultant. Links to her portfolio, blogs, favorite
quotes, and photos can be found at writewaypro.weebly.com. Her portfolio
is at ariellabrown.contently.com.
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