If 3D printers have had a notable limitation, it’s been the small size of their output. We’ve talked about how they can make everything from action figures and car parts to human bones and scale models. But 3D printing is getting bigger, both physically and commercially, as enterprising engineers aim to create the first market-ready prototype of a printer that can produce complete buildings on-site. And according to a story in Blueprint Magazine, the leader in the clubhouse is Italian inventor Enrico Dini and his d-shape printer.

It’s currently housed in a shed near Pisa, Italy, and it features an armature that prints out the building materials layer by layer using CAD software. According to Dini, the main advantages of his invention are that it’s significantly faster, cheaper, and more eco-friendly than traditional building methods. In addition, it simplifies the process of building “Gaudiesque, curvy structures,” and you can either print on-site or print the parts remotely and ship them, which minimizes the need for on-site workers.

The d-shape isn’t just a fanciful design. In fact, it will be printing a proof of principle test structure in the form of an egg-shaped pavilion named Radiolaria in Pontedera, Italy sometime this spring. In addition, Dini is working with the European Space Agency to research printing buildings on the moon. He also hopes to one day use his 3D printer to finish the Sagrada Familia cathedral in Barcelona.

By all accounts, the d-shape 3D printer is a labor of love for Enrico Dini. He’s spent seven years on the project, and it’s cost him a marriage and nearly all his finances. But the wait has apparently been worth it as the construction of the Radiolaria pavilion fast approaches. And in the bigger picture, thanks to Dini and 3D printing technology, we could be getting an up-close look at the future of architecture within the next year.

(Story via TomsGuide.com; Photo via D-Shape Presentation; Learn more at D-Shape.com)

A 3D printer that prints out meals and snacks isn’t a new concept. CandyFab prints candy, and the MIT Fluid Interfaces Group recently released a design for a printer that stores and cooks food. Now Philips has dipped its toe into the embryonic market for 3D food printing with its Food Creation Concept design. The idea is that you can put in your desired ingredients, and the printer makes your meal in whatever shape and texture you want using the influence of molecular gastronomy. Perhaps more importantly, the printer would be able to adjust nutritional value based on electronic input from a sensor that measures your individual needs.

As you can guess, there’s no timetable or projected release date for the printer. It’s just an idea intended to promote discussion and assess consumer interest. What’s interesting to me is that besides Electrolux’s Moléculaire, the Philips Food Creation concept is the only time I’ve seen a major company take food printing seriously. But for all the growing buzz, I wonder why we haven’t seen an actual working prototype yet, despite the fact that we can already print candy.

Of course, as someone whose cooking skills are limited to boiling water and operating a microwave, I figure there’s a good reason that food printers only seem to exist in drawings. One issue may be that the more varied and complex ingredients in regular food are tougher to translate to a 3D printer than the simpler ingredients in candy. Personally, I’d like to see someone start an open source project (if they haven’t already) like CandyFab, Makerbot, or RepRap and let the public develop and refine it on their own. In any case, until the 3D food printer becomes an affordable home kitchen appliance, I guess I’ll have to go out to get a decent meal.

(Story via Wired.com)

If truth is stranger than fiction, then 3D printing could be the basis for the next great TV hospital drama. We’ve already seen how this innovative technology can re-create human bones. But given the global shortage of organ donors, a printer that rolls out viable organs and tissue from scratch could literally save lives with the touch of a button. Biotech firm Organovo and Australian manufacturer Invetech have announced the world’s first commercial 3D bio-printer. It uses the same general technology as your average industrial model, and costs a cool $200,000.

Making organs from scratch isn’t a new phenomenon. A few years ago, Dr. Anthony Atala of Wake Forest originated a method for producing bladders. The process involves taking tissue from the recipient’s bladder (to avoid organ rejection later on), taking precursor cells out of the tissue sample, growing them, and then painting them onto a biodegradable scaffold. After several weeks of cultivation, the cells develop and become a viable bladder. By contrast, the automated 3D printing method would involve creating a 3D model of the organ on a computer, digitally slicing the model into thin cross-sections, and then printing out the organ layer by layer using cells as ink. As a result, the manufacturing process should become cheaper, faster, and more precise.

All that said, don’t expect the new 3D bio-printer to be churning out hearts and lungs right away. According to Organovo CEO Keith Murphy, the machine will only be printing “simple tissues, such as skin, muscle and short stretches of blood vessels” to be used in research. Clinical trials and additional research are needed before the technology can be applied to more complex organs and parts for use in transplants, and that could take at least a few years. But while that sounds like a long time, it appears that patients will have more than one horse to place their bets on as multiple companies compete to set the industry standard. So if capitalism works as it should, perhaps the waiting time for organs and tissues will get a lot shorter a lot sooner than we think.

(Story via NYTimes; Photo via Morguefile)

Printers that are capable of making 3D objects have been around for awhile, albeit at prices that your average consumer can’t afford. But apparently HP has seen the future, and now they’ll be the first big-name printer maker to release their own 3D printer later this year. Actually, the company will be lending its name to a machine manufactured by Stratasys, which makes the uPrint 3D printer that Jay Leno uses. No word on pricing for the HP printer, but the uPrint goes for $15,000.

What’s interesting to me is that HP isn’t actually manufacturing the printers. It’s not a bad arrangement when you think about it – Stratasys is a relatively unknown company that can benefit from the “sales and distribution” expertise and resources of a big brand name, and HP can save its R&D dollars while getting a feel for the 3D printing market. Whether or not the new printer is an improvement on previous models in terms of price and functionality, the fact that HP is getting in on the 3D printing revolution proves that this is an emerging field worth watching in the years to come.

(Story via CNET; Photo via Morguefile)

We already know that 3D printers can print out edible confections. But you can’t live on candy forever, right? For those who need more balanced nutrition from their 3D printing machines, the Fluid Interfaces Group at MIT is working on Cornucopia, a design for a printer that makes full meals.

The interesting part of Cornucopia is that it covers every step in the cooking process. It refrigerates and stores ingredients, measures them out, mixes them, prints them out in layers, and cooks them. If every element works as it should, the world will never view all-in-one printers the same way again.

Of course, we’re talking about a project, not an actual product. Until there’s a working prototype, questions will abound. Is it easy to clean? Will richer ingredients clog the printheads? Most importantly, how much will the printer and the ingredient canisters cost? It’s obviously too early to answer the inquiries, but I’ll be curious about how it develops as the project progresses. Until then, it looks like a 3D printer’s place may be in the home or the auto shop, and not in the kitchen.

(Photo via MIT Fluid Interfaces Group)

Art and architecture seem to be the most likely applications for the new printing method. When it comes to architecture, 3D printing could be especially useful for rapid prototyping, where architects can quickly test different kinds of glass to see which designs are the best in certain circumstances. A greener use for 3D glass printing would be recycling old glass and using it as the powder for new glass. Also, who knows – if the price for the technology is as affordable as MakerBot, we may see people bypass the local Crate and Barrel and make their own glassware. In any case, consider glass as another frontier conquered in 3D printing’s steady integration into mainstream applications.

(Photo via Morguefile)

Imagine if you could print any 3D component you need, including the parts to reproduce a functioning copy of the same printer you’re printing with. RepRap, an online 3D printing initiative, is getting closer and closer to making it all a reality. Visit the website and you’ll find full instructions for assembling and operating your own RepRap printer. There’s also a wide range of resources that can help you optimize your printer, from videos to an extensive user and developer community. Unlike the $4995 Desktop Factory 125 ci, it only costs around 500 euros (US $716) plus some labor on your part to make the RepRap.

Of course, the most notable feature of the RepRap printer is its ability to replicate itself. The current version can make around 60% of its own parts minus the nuts and bolts. The developers plan to increase that percentage in the next version by giving the printer the ability to print out its own circuitry. The ultimate goal seems to be the supplanting of factories by home 3D printers that can save consumers time and money as they print exactly what they need, when they need it, and where they need it.

Personally, I like how inventor Adrian Bowyer compares humans and the RepRap to insects and flowers, respectively. In a truly symbiotic relationship, insects get their nourishment from the flowers, and in return, the flowers are able to reproduce through the insects. RepRap is certainly an intriguing project, and its development could provide a major benefit to countries and economies large and small.

Everyone and everything has its price, and up until now, the MSRP for a 3D printer has been a little steep for most consumers at upwards of $5000. Enter Makerbot, a sub $1000 model that prints toys, parts for your contraptions, and more. This 3D printer comes in two versions – the $750 Basic model and the $950 Deluxe model. Maximum size for output is 4”x4”x6”. Keep in mind that the printer requires some basic assembly before you can use it.

To me, the most interesting aspect of this story is how far the price has come down for 3D printers in the last two years. Back in November 2007, we covered the Desktop Factory 125ci, a relatively affordable model at $4995. We also recently wrote about the uPrint 3D printer, which goes for $15000. All the talk regarding 3D printers has been about how regular consumers would one day be able to afford them, and now they’re the same price as a midrange office laser printer.

So does all this mean 3D printers will start selling like hotcakes? According to Wired.com, more than 200 Makerbot printers have been sold since they first came out in April 2009. And I especially like how users refer to the Makerbot as “having China on your desktop.” Not exactly a politically correct statement, but it underscores the fact that over time, with its wide range of applications, 3D printers can potentially pay for themselves if you use them often enough. In any event, 3D printing is as accessible as ever, and consumers should be reaping the benefits for the foreseeable future.

(Story via Wired; Photo via Makerbot.com)

The metal figures look pretty interesting, and I get the feeling the jewelry offerings will be equally popular. Personally, I’d like to see an action figure with moving parts, like the Superman toys I used to collect back in the 80s, or maybe a Rock Em Sock Em Robots set. Come on Shapeways community – make it happen.

(Story via Underwire; Photo via Esther McFarlane)

The moral of the story is that 3D printing can be extremely useful, especially in manufacturing replacements for otherwise irreplaceable parts. Just as we saw with human thumb bones, you can essentially create the missing piece to a puzzle by accurately scanning the original, slicing the 3D image into thin cross-sections, and then printing and re-stacking those cross-sections for an accurate replica.

All that said, it’s not as though anyone can just head to the local Target or WalMart and pick up a scanner and 3D printer for themselves. According to Popular Mechanics, the NextEngine Scanner goes for a cool $2995, while the Dimension uPrint 3D Printer costs a shade under $15,000. Regardless, the fact that this technology even exists and is already this advanced should make almost anyone feel optimistic that one day, they can recover whatever they’ve lost with a press of a button.

(Story via Coolest-Gadgets.com, Photo via DimensionPrinting.com)