3-D Printed Pizza to Feed Mars Colonists?

Discovery News

By Ian O'Neill

One of the biggest challenges facing humanity in space is: how to cultivate food. Coincidentally, one of the biggest challenges facing the entire planet in the near future will be: how to cultivate enough food to support an ever-swelling population. Wouldn’t it be delicious if both challenges could be solved, or at least partially solved, using the same, open-source technology?
Enter the 3-D printer: your all-in-one solution to lunar habitat-building, gun-making and space pizza preparation! Now, the latter has grabbed the attention of NASA, which has approved a $125,000 grant for a mechanical engineer to develop a prototype of his universal food synthesizer based on 3-D printing technology.
ANALYSIS: 3-D Printed Space Food For the Gourmet Astronaut
3-D printing certainly isn’t new to the space technology arena. It has been pegged as a potential answer to building habitats on the moon and Mars, for example. A 3-D printer could be landed onto a planetary body ahead of a human mission and it could automatically construct habitable structures out of locally-mined materials.
Also, there’s some hypothetical ideas for the future of 3-D printed satellites. It seems that once the technology matures, complex components for machines and other space equipment could be manufactured in situ.
But what about food?
Launching supplies into space is, of course, costly. So the ultimate aim for any long-duration interplanetary trip or long-term human presence on the surface of Mars would be to develop sustainable food cultivation techniques. A supply of fresh veggies would be the backbone of any healthy colony! But before we see a renewable supply of Mars mushrooms and cosmic cucumbers, we’d need to change the way we see food. The 3-D printer could just do that.
ANALYSIS: Print Me a Condo on the Moon!
To Anjan Contractor, of Systems and Materials Research Corporation (SMRC) in Austin, Texas, food is just a collection of compounds that can be isolated in the form of a powder. These different varieties of powder can then be mixed with oils and water, combined by his 3-D printer. Governed not by a paperback recipe book, the printer would be controlled by software recipes. Food can then be printed to order.
Interestingly, an individual’s dietary requirements can be tightly controlled — in the future of Mars colonization, this could prove to be very useful. Colonists’ food could be easily fortified with vitamins or minerals they are lacking. One could imagine medicines being added to foodstuffs via computer commands. Once you strip down food into its barest of components, our future Mars colonists could keep very close tabs on their calorie intake and general health.
In an interview with Quartz, Contractor outlined his vision of eliminating food waste — the powder his system will use is shelf-stable for up to 30-years. For long-duration spaceflight, this would be a huge advantage.
“Long distance space travel requires 15-plus years of shelf life,” he said. “The way we are working on it is, all the carbs, proteins and macro and micro nutrients are in powder form. We take moisture out, and in that form it will last maybe 30 years.”
ANALYSIS: Domino’s Pizza Moon Plan is All Topping, No Base
With his NASA Small Business Innovation Research program grant, Contractor will build a “pizza printer.” Although that may not sound very appetizing, pizza is an obvious choice for a first 3-D printed food as it can be layered with ingredients. The first layer, the dough, will be printed onto a hot plate that will immediately bake the base of the pizza. Then, powdered tomato puree will be mixed with oil and layered over the top. A layer of protein will also be added.
This isn’t the first 3-D printed food concept to make it into the limelight. As reported by Discovery News’ Markus Hammonds in February, the company Fab@Home is also developing a 3-D printer to create foodstuffs out of “edible hydrocolloidal suspensions” (gel-like mixtures of solids and liquids). In their research, they’ve stumbled into an “uncanny valley of food” where the 3-D foods don’t feel quite right when eaten. More work is obviously needed to understand how to mimic not only the flavors, but also the texture of food.
Contractor hopes, however, that by making his 3-D food synthesizer open-source, that once his technology is matured and released to the world, others will innovate and develop the technology, perhaps overcoming this unsavory uncanny valley.
Although the applications in space are obvious — and even Jean Luc Picard would be impressed by this modest attempt at a Star Trek replicator — Contractor is acutely aware that this idea may, one day, transform the way we conceive food here on Earth. This in-turn may help feed the planet.
“I think, and many economists think, that current food systems can’t supply 12 billion people sufficiently,” he said. “So we eventually have to change our perception of what we see as food.”
So will the first manufactured food on Mars be a 3-D printed pizza from a 3-D printed Pizza Hut? If so, may I suggest the first family-sized pizza be called the “Olympus Mons-ter.”
via SPACE.com

3-D Printed Pizza to Feed Mars Colonists?

«Clic, imprimir, arma», un documental sobre las armas impresas en 3D

Microsiervos

En Vice: Click, imprimir, arma: la historia del movimiento de las armas creadas con impresoras 3d,

Cody R. Wilson. Wilson, de 25 años, es un estudiante de derecho en la Universidad de Texas que está trabajando en la construcción de armas semiautomáticas utilizando una impresora 3D. La primera vez que escuché su nombre fue hablando con un colega después de que Wilson subiera un vídeo en Indiegogo demostrando qué intenciones tenía con su recién adquirida impresora Stratasys 3D (una impresora que Stratasys le arrebató más tarde).

Uno de los problemas más evidentes es que este tipo de armas son invisibles para los detectores de metales, aunque la munición tiene que seguir siendo necesariamente de verdad y hay que poder comprarla. El percutor también tiene que ser metálico, aunque se trate de un clavo.

En EE UU se ha levantado bastante revuelo con el asunto. El verdadero problema, según Businessweek, es que en aquel país es más fácil comprar un arma que imprimirla,

Let's All Calm Down About 3D Plastic Guns — Con algo de conocimientos es posible hacer un arma en el sótano de casa, y hay formas menos complicadas de conseguirlas que utilizando un equipo informático de 10.000 dólares. Por internet puedes comprar cualquier cosa desde una pistola Glock de 9 mm a un rifle semiautomático de tipo militar con cargador para 30 proyectiles.

En otros países, caso de España, es mucho más difícil comprar armas y munición de este tipo. Por ejemplo, en España «la razón de defensa de personas o bienes, por sí sola, no justifica la concesión de la licencia» para armas cortas, informa la Guardia Civil. En EE UU es al contrario, ésta razón es en la que se basa el derecho a tener y llevar armas.

De nuevo se demuestra —como leí por ahí hace poco, no recuerdo dónde— que según se utilice la tecnología puede ser buena o puede ser mala, pero nunca es neutra.

«Clic, imprimir, arma», un documental sobre las armas impresas en 3D

3D-printed ‘bionic’ ear melds electronics and biology

KurzweilAI

Scientists at Princeton University have used a 3D printer to create a functional ear that can “hear” radio frequencies up to microwave frequencies.

Scientists used 3-D printing to merge tissue and an antenna capable of receiving radio signals (credit: Frank Wojciechowski)Añadir leyenda

The researchers’ primary purpose was to explore an efficient and versatile means to merge electronics with tissue. The scientists used 3D printing of cells and nanoparticles, followed by cell culture to combine a small coil antenna with cartilage, creating what they term a “bionic ear.”

There are mechanical and thermal challenges with interfacing electronic materials with biological materials, as Michael McAlpine, an assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Princeton and the lead researcher points out.

Response of the bionic ear to radio frequencies in terms of the forward power
transmission coefficient (credit: Manu S Mannoor et al./Nano Letters)

However. McAlpine’s team has made several advances in recent years involving the use of small-scale medical sensors and antenna. Last year, a research effort led by McAlpine and Naveen Verma, an assistant professor of electrical engineering, and Fio Omenetto of Tufts University, resulted in the development of a “tattoo” made up of a biological sensor and antenna that can be affixed to the surface of a tooth.

Standard tissue engineering involves seeding types of cells, such as those that form ear cartilage, onto a scaffold of a polymer material called a hydrogel. But the researchers said that this technique has problems replicating complicated three-dimensional biological structures. Ear reconstruction “remains one of the most difficult problems in the field of plastic and reconstructive surgery,” they wrote.

To solve the problem, the team turned to 3D printing, its first use to interweave tissue with electronics, the researchers say. The technique allowed them to combine the antenna electronics with tissue within the highly complex topology of a human ear.

The researchers used a Fab@Home 3D printer to combine a matrix of hydrogel and calf cells with silver nanoparticles, which form an antenna. The printed bioelectronic hybrid ear construct was then cultured in vitro to enable cartilage to grow.

The finished ear consists of a coiled antenna inside a cartilage structure. Two wires lead from the base of the ear and wind around a helical “cochlea” — the part of the ear that senses sound — which can connect to electrodes.

(Top) Optical images of the functional materials, including biological (chondrocyte cells), structural (silicone), and electronic (AgNP-infused silicone) used to form the bionic ear. (Bottom) 3D printer used for the printing process. (Credit: Manu S Mannoor et al./Nano Letters)

McAlpine cautions that further work and extensive testing would need to be done before a version of the technology could be used on a patient for normal hearing. He said the ear in principle could be used to restore or enhance human hearing.

He said electrical signals produced by the ear could be connected to a patient’s nerve endings, similar to a hearing aid. The current system receives radio waves, but he said the research team plans to incorporate other materials, such as pressure-sensitive electronic sensors, to enable the ear to register ordinary acoustic sounds.

Support for the project was provided by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, NIH, and the Grand Challenges Program at Princeton University.

3D-printed ‘bionic’ ear melds electronics and biology

Guns and garden gnomes: 3-D printer revolution is now

Technology on NBCNews.com

LANCE ROSENFIELD / Redux Pictures

LANCE ROSENFIELD / Redux Pictures

Cody Wilson, who is in the process of developing a gun that will be printed on a 3-D printer, in Austin, Texas.

Addressing a packed auditorium at Austin’s South by Southwest festival last March, Bre Pettis, keynote speaker and co-founder of MakerBot, one of the leaders in desktop 3-D printers, described the increased interest and affordability of his company’s product as heralding the “the next Industrial Revolution.”

"Revolution" is often used even when the result doesn't match the definition — a complete change from the way things were before. Add "Industrial," and the comparison implies not just a change in manufacturing, but society as well, from improved living standards to changes in social class structure. Whether — and how — desktop 3-D printing can bring such changes is much debated, and remains to be seen.

Thanks to companies such as MakerBot, the bulk, expense and technical inefficiency that kept the 30-year-old technology known as Additive Manufacturing — or 3-D printing — confined to major laboratories and factories, is a thing of the past. Now, for less than $3,000, anyone with basic computer skills and an interest in learning more can download and personalize or create a computer-assisted design (CAD) that a printer will fabricate, layer by layer of filament.

Pettis is not the first to make the “next Industrial Revolution” comparison. For some within the maker community — subculture of tech-based do-it-yourself-ers — the increased accessibility of 3-D printer technology means "the end of consumerism.” Conversely, tech analysis firms Gartner predicts that 3-D printing could create opportunities for new product lines created in-house by local retailers. And Daniel Suarez, who spent a decade developing logistics and production planning software for major multinational corporations (and is also a best-selling novelist who writes about near-future technologies) predicts that "3-D printing will be a disruptive economic force in the next two decades — but I also think this disruption will benefit average Americans by causing a resurgence in local manufacturing."

Fervor over 3-D printing’s potential has only increased since SXSW, when Pettis introduced a prototype for the MakerBot Digitizer, which will scan small objects with the end goal of 3-D fabrication. He illustrated the Digitizer’s potential with a projection of a garden gnome, scanned to create … another garden gnome.

For those who don’t so much see an endless supply of home-printed garden gnomes as “revolution,” so much as a shot at getting on A&E’s “Hoarders,” there’s Cody Wilson, the notorious public face of Defense Distributed. Wilson is a University of Texas law student recently licensed to manufacture guns by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. In March, Defense Distributed, much to the consternation of gun control advocates, printed the plastic lower receiver for an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle — the portion of a firearm that carries the serial number — which that can fire more than 600 rounds.

Scary, legal and — as Wilson points out — a 3-D printed result that actually does something.

MakerBot

Wilson latched on to Pettis’s garden gnome to express his frustration with the maker community to make something more than geegaws during his riveting yet sparsely attended SXSW presentation about Defense Distributed and DefCAD, an open-source CAD design website he launched after MakerBot’s Thingiverse CAD site dumped all the gun designs from the site following the mass shooting in Newtown, Conn.

A cursory scan on Thingiverse finds a sea of files to create iPhone cases, and myriad holders and stands, but other than clock components, parts to complete a cigar box ukulele, and a theoretical design for a working camera, there isn’t a lot on the open source data base that does stuff.

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Wilson is using the platform of 3-D printing to make a political statement about— and push the boundaries of — liberty and the freedom to share information. “I think this isn't a project about firearms, it’s a project about political equality,” Wilson recently told NBC’s Nightly News.

The potential Wilson sees for for 3-D printers isn't just about guns, but prosthetics and other medical devices, even drugs, putting the means of production in the hands of the people.

Pettis and Wilson are often portrayed as polar opposites in the 3-D printer movement, but they both face the inevitable roadblock of all new digital technology — intellectual copyright law.

"When it comes to 3-D printers, groups producing tools, weapons, and reproducing patented or copyrighted objects will be where all the debate and legal fireworks will occur," Suarez told NBC News.

"Sure, a copyright holder might get upset when individuals reproduce their trademarked cartoon character as little plastic tchotchkes, but I suspect this will follow the same path as digital music and torrented video — namely, there will be several high profile legal cases against perceived infringers until big companies realize technological advances have made this an unstoppable tide."

And so begins the revolution.

Guns and garden gnomes: 3-D printer revolution is now

3D Print Demo

Pajamasmedia

3D Print Demo

Would You Eat Steak From a Printer?

freakonomics

(Photo: Cea)

We’ve talked before about one possible future of food production: food printers.  Andras Forgacs is the CEO of a company called Modern Meadow, which is working on printing leather and meat products. He recently took questions on reddit.com; here’s his take on his company’s progress with replicating hamburger and steak:

Real steak is a big stretch. It won’t be the first product since steak is very hard to make for now. Instead, the first wave of meat products to be made with this approach will likely be minced meats (burgers, sausages, etc.) and pates (goose liver pate, etc.). Also seafood is an early possibility since the texture requires may be easier to achieve than premium cuts.

While I doubt anyone will make commercial quantities of premium steak within 10 years, we will eventually get there but it will be an Nth generation product.

And here’s an interesting talk Forgacs gave on the technology:

(HT: Daily Dish)

Would You Eat Steak From a Printer?

3D printed car is as strong as steel, half the weight, and nearing production

kurzweilai

Picture an assembly line not that isn’t made up of robotic arms spewing sparks to weld heavy steel, but a warehouse of plastic-spraying printers producing light, cheap and highly efficient automobiles. If Jim Kor’s dream is realized, that’s exactly how the next generation of urban runabouts will be produced, Wired reports. His creation is called the … more >>

3D printed car is as strong as steel, half the weight, and nearing production

Scientists Use 3-D Printer to Speed Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research

Image of human embryo stem cell droplets courtesy of Will Shu/Biofabrication

scientificamerican

By Larry Greenemeier

Every week, it seems, there’s a new breakthrough in 3-D printing that promises us the ability to (eventually) fabricate some new thing in one of those glass-walled wonder boxes. Such things have included everything from spare parts for the International Space Station above to the beef on our dinner plates to the organs inside our bodies. Although this last idea of fabricating body parts may seem the most fanciful, a team of scientists is reporting a breakthrough in 3-D printing using human embryonic stem cells that could purportedly lead to life-like bioengineered tissue and, eventually, artificial organs tailor-made for specific patients.
Researchers have been able to engineer tissue samples in the past by combining artificial scaffold-like structures and animal cells. Depositing human embryonic stem cells in cultures using a 3-D printer offers some advantages. In particular, the cells can be positioned in droplets of uniform size cheaper, faster and more easily than using manual methods. This uniformity is important for researchers trying to generate specific cell types.

Image of 3-D cell printer courtesy of Colin Hattersley

Whereas human embryonic stem cells have proved too fragile to print in the past, scientists at Scotland’s Heriot-Watt University and Roslin Cellab, a stem cell technology company, say they have developed a new technique that allowed them to deposit droplets of a consistent size containing living cells that survived the process and maintained their ability to develop into different types of mature cells. The research will be published Tuesday in the journal Biofabrication.
In the 3-D printing process, generally a nozzle resembling an inkjet deposits thin layers of resin or a polymer that hardens—either naturally or after being sintered by a laser—into a particular structure. So-called “bioprinters” naturally use cells rather than plastics to create organic structures. However, this technique can damage the printed cells, so the Heriot-Watt and Roslin Cellab scientists developed a printing system driven by pneumatic pressure and controlled by the opening and closing of a microvalve. The researchers could precisely control the amount of cells dispensed by changing the nozzle diameter, the inlet air pressure or the opening time of the valve.

The scientists acknowledge that other researchers have in the past printed mouse embryonic stem cells and even certain types of human stem cells. Human embryonic stem cells, although more sensitive to physical manipulation, can generate a wider variety of specific cell types than other forms of human stem cells. In addition, any tissue formed would yield better models of human biology than those formed from mouse cells.
The use of embryonic stem cells has been a source of controversy particularly in the United States. Last month the US Supreme Court ended an effort to shut down government support of human embryonic stem cell research by refusing to hear a case that challenged the legality of funding for the work by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). This means NIH-funded researchers can continue to work with the 195 new human embryonic stem cell lines the federal government has made available to them.
Despite the success reported by the Scottish scientists, 3-D-printed organs are still decades away from reality. Unlike the skin and muscle tissue that some researchers have successfully fabricated in the lab, solid organs such as the liver, kidney and heart require complex vascular structures that allow them to absorb nutrients and discard waste. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania’s Tissue Microfabrication Laboratory, the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine and elsewhere are developing methods for bioengineering functional vessels that could someday be used to ferry blood around 3-D-printed organs.
A more immediate benefit of 3-D printing embryonic stem cells might be the ability to make tissue samples that could be used to accurately test drug compounds for toxicity in humans, without the need for animal testing, according to the researchers.

Scientists Use 3-D Printer to Speed Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research

Will 3D Printed Guns Bring Anarchy Or End Gun Control?

Read at theblaze >>

Will 3D Printed Guns Bring Anarchy Or End Gun Control?

3-D-printed airplane takes to the skies

FutureTech

University of Virginia

The 3-D-printed unmanned aerial vehicle, "dressed" in the colors of University of Virginia.

3-D printers are already being used to create machine parts and small toys, but engineers have now used the technology to build an entire vehicle: a plastic, unmanned airplane that actually flies.

The plane, created by engineering students at the University of Virginia (U.Va.), has a 6.5-foot wingspan, and was made from assembled printed parts.

University of Virginia engineer David Sheffler and students Steven Easter and Jonathan Turman pose with their 3-D printed plane.

The team tested their creation during four flights in August and early September at Milton Airfield near Keswick, Va. The aircraft, which is only the third 3-D-printed plane known to have been built and flown, achieved a cruising speed of 45 mph.

3-D printing is already proving to be a valuable tool in teaching students, said David Sheffler, an engineer at U.Va. who worked with students Steven Easter and Jonathan Turman to create the aircraft.

“To make a plastic turbofan engine to scale five years ago would have taken two years, at a cost of about $250,000,” Sheffler said in a statement. “But with 3-D printing we designed and built it in four months for about $2,000. This opens up an arena of teaching that was not available before. It allows us to train engineers for the real challenges they will face in industry.”

— via University of Virginia

3-D-printed airplane takes to the skies