3-D Printing Technology

Researchers at the Biomedical Research Institute at Hasselt University in Belgium designed a 3-D implantable jaw made out of titanium powder, which was built by a metal-parts manufacturing company called LayerWise. Reuben Wauthle, an engineer at LayerWise, reported that the design was very complicated but did not take long to print--"Once we received the 3D digital design, the part was split up automatically into 2D layers and then we sent those cross sections to the printing machine. It used a laser beam to melt successive thin layers of titanium powder together to build the part. This was repeated with each cross section melted to the previous layer. It took 33 layers to build 1mm of height, so you can imagine there were many thousand layers necessary to build this jawbone." The jaw was implanted into a patient with chronic bone infection, who was not a candidate for reconstructive surgery, due to severe risk. The operation was a success and took 4 hours to attach the implant, which is 1/5 the amount of time it takes for a traditional reconstruction. Further surgery is required to screw in a set of dentures and remove healing implants. Mr. Wauthle says "You can build parts that you can't create using any other technique. For example you can print porous titanium structures which allow bone in-growth and allow a better fixation of the implant, giving it a longer lifetime." This article specifically interests me because, the success of this technology has paved the way for further 3-D printing techniques, which could revolutionize medicine and implantable organs.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-16907104