Last January it was reported that a group of researchers in the U.K. was busy trying to beat competitors in Japan and the United States in the “printing” of body tissue.
This week Wired reported on progress in the U.S.
Led by University of Missouri-Columbia biological physics professor Gabor Forgacs and aided by a $5 million National Science Foundation grant, researchers at three universities have developed bio-ink and bio-paper that could make so-called organ printing a reality.
So far, they’ve made tubes similar to human blood vessels and sheets of heart muscle cells, printed in three dimensions on a special printer.
There is some hesitation from the scientists involved to speculate how far this technology could go. But one participate offered this:
“I think this is going to be a biggie,” said Glenn D. Prestwich, the University of Utah professor who developed the bio-paper. “A lot of things are going to be a pain in the butt to print, but I think we can do livers and kidneys as well.”
Read the whole thing.