Article in the Economist
http://www.economist.com/node/15543683
Organovo, a company that specializes in regenerative medicine, and Invetech, an engineering and automation firm have been working together to develop a prototype of which a 3D bio-printer is based. This 3D bio-printer would start out producing simple tissues such as skin and muscle; however, Keith Murphy the Chief printers. In the future, possibly even kidneys, livers, and hearts may be produced. The printer works by fusing small clusters of cells to mature into functioning body parts. This idea stemmed from the idea of growing organs and body tissue from scratch, which has been performed successfully with bladders in 2006. This idea to grow scaffolds was a good idea; however, it is completely time consuming and bio-printing would be faster and more efficient. Patients who would usually have to wait for months at a time could just simply buy an organ and immediately have their lives saved. The cells produced by the bio-printer are extracted from adult bone marrow and fat as the precursors that will later develop into differentiated types of cells. THe droplets retain their shape and can pass easily through the inkjet printing process. The second printing head deposits scaffolding (a sugar-based hydrogel) to hold the structure together and arrow the droplets to fuse together. Once the printing is complete the hydrogel will be peeled away. The printer would fit into a standard laboratory biosafety cabinet for sterile operation and would have a computer graphics system to allow cross-sections of body parts to be designed. The machines may eventually one day be able to insert the organs directly into the body. This step for medicine would help patients world wide and save many lives.
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