Flesh Factory
Extra! Extra! Human Tissue, Hot Off The Press
arindam
arindam
30 May, 2013
The wonders of this 3D printer developed by scientists never seem to cease.
A technology that was barely heard of until a couple of years ago is now making regular news for its groundbreaking ability to print anything from a functioning gun to an invisibility cloak, and might change manufacturing trends as we know them. And the wonders of this 3D printer never seem to cease. VentureBeat reports that scientists at Oxford University have printed what could be the predecessor to usable synthetic human tissue. In their paper A Tissue Like Material, the researchers announced that they had created their own version of a 3D printer to print out a series of droplets that formed a network of humanlike cells which could act like nerves and send electrical signals across the network. According to PhsyOrg, the researchers said that while the printed cells were nearly five times bigger than normal human cells, they were certain that they could be printed smaller. The cells can live for a few weeks; long enough, that is, for some wicked purposes.
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