This week: why the real frontier in 3D-printed biomaterials is regulatory legibility, not geometry; European neurosurgery quietly moves its printers in-house; a first-in-human 3D-printed cartilage implant; fresh calls for bioprinting standards; and titanium lattices that float. Plus our free Sept 10 Biomaterials Frontier event.

The big thing

The material is the frontier now

For a decade, 3D printing in medicine was a story about shape — patient-specific anatomy, geometries no mold could make, “complexity for free.” In 2026, the center of gravity has moved. The question that decides whether a printed part reaches a patient is no longer “what shape can we print?” but “what material can we print, and will a regulator accept it?” Call it the move toward regulator-legible material systems.

“Legible” is not a metaphor. A regulator approves evidence: documentation that a material behaves the same way every time, degrades on a predictable schedule, releases nothing harmful, and is made to a specification you can point to. For years, printed biomaterials failed that test — beautiful one-off scaffolds with no agreed test methods, batch-to-batch drift, and properties that shifted with every machine setting. Brilliant science a reviewer couldn’t sign off, and no basis for a product.

The reason they are hard to read is that, in additive manufacturing, the material and the process are inseparable. A resin cured layer-by-layer on a specific printer, wavelength, and post-cure is effectively a different material each time. So the field now talks about material systems, feedstock, validated print parameters, post-processing, sterilization, and standardized tests, all made legible through standards such as ISO/ASTM 52900, ASTM F42 and F04, ISO 10993, and ISO 13485. We walk through what each of those standards actually asks of a printed material and where the gaps still are in the full article.

This should be an investment thesis, not a chore. The moment a printed biomaterial becomes regulator-legible, it crosses from research risk to a fundable product. With the healthcare 3D-printing market projected to reach roughly $33 billion by 2031, the binding constraint could shift from the printer to the material.

That is the subject of our next event. “Biomaterials Frontier for 3D Printing,” a free 3DHEALS virtual session on September 10, 2026, convenes the people making materials legible fastest — a bioresorbable-polymer and ASTM standards leader, a human-collagen biofabrication founder, an AI materials-discovery researcher, and more.

Register free: 3dheals.com/biomaterials-frontier

Regulatory watch

• Nanochon begins first-in-human study of its 3D-printed Chondrograft knee implant — The 3D-printed cartilage implant, which holds FDA Breakthrough Device Designation, treated its first patient; it targets “pre-replacement” knees. Not a 510(k), but the week’s clearest AM-device regulatory milestone. (Sep 3)
• Advancing European standards and regulations for 3D bioprinting — A Trends in Biotechnology perspective argues that clinical and preclinical adoption of 3D bioprinting hinges on developing European standards and a regulatory pathway. Peer-reviewed. (Sep 3)

Clinical & research

• European neurosurgery survey finds 3D printing shifting in-house as implant use grows (Int. J. Bioprinting / 3D Printing Industry) — 2020-vs-2025 survey: neurosurgeon-run printing rose from 0% to ~21%, external providers fell to zero, and implant fabrication climbed from 0% to more than a quarter of departments — raising the quality and regulatory stakes as hospitals become manufacturers.
• Three-dimensional bioprinting in reconstructive plastic surgery: a comprehensive review (Cells) — Maps translational readiness tissue by tissue — skin, cartilage, bone, osteochondral, vascularized and craniofacial constructs — with bioink-selection guidance. Peer-reviewed.
• Systematic review of 3D-printed surgical devices for austere environments (Frontiers in Medical Technology) — Imperial College London and UK Defence Medical Services reviewed 15 studies and found evaluation wildly inconsistent — little standardized strength testing, sparse sterilization data, no biocompatibility testing — and propose an ISO/ASTM-aligned framework. Peer-reviewed.

From 3DHEALS

The Lattice Podcast, Ep. 125: Inside technology transfer at UCLA with Mark Wisniewski — How university tech transfer moves medical innovation from the lab bench toward a fundable product — a fitting companion to this week’s “research risk to product” theme.

Also this week

• How RMIT researchers made 3D-printed titanium float on water — Foam sealed inside the hollow struts of Ti-6Al-4V lattices makes the first buoyant metal lattice. The demo is a marine buoy, but the hollow-strut titanium-lattice method maps onto load-bearing implant design. (Sep 4)

Subscribe to The Lattice Brief

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In our recent 3DHEALS event, we dug deep into the world of New Approach Methodologies (NAMs), which describes any strategy for testing new medicines that replaces traditional animal testing. NAMs are particularly important to healthcare 3D printing enthusiasts, as they represent a burgeoning opportunity for bioprinted tissues and organ-on-a-chip platforms to reach close-term commercial success and dramatically change the regulatory landscape. The United States Food and Drug Administration’s shift away from animal testing in favor of more ethical and convincing alternatives is opening doors for innovators, but it is certainly not without its challenges. What exactly is a NAM? Will it actually lead to reduced costs and safer outcomes? Or will the allure of new technologies fool us into believing false promises? In this recap article, we’ll highlight the latest in NAMs from our event’s five expert industry panelists.

What are New Approach Methodologies (NAMs)?

New Approach Methodologies (NAMs) broadly encompass organ-on-a-chip devices, bioprinted cells/tissues, and computational simulations (notably, artificial intelligence) to test the safety of new therapeutics. While one of the main motivators is to reduce animal testing for ethical reasons, there is strong interest in identifying NAMs that better model human responses to novel medications. After all, a mouse isn’t a human, and it certainly isn’t easy (nor cheap) to raise mice.

Dr. Mike Clements, Senior Vice President for Scientific Partnerships and Strategy at Axion BioSystems, described how this regulatory shift increases flexibility in how evidence can be acquired but that the scientific bar hasn’t changed: the new test still needs to be relevant, reproducible, and appropriate. While such a change sounds nice in principle, it opens up a plethora of complications. Flexibility begets variability and ambiguity, which is quite the opposite of what we would want in a pre-clinical test.

Dr. Clements stressed the importance of standardization as one way to advance NAMs. For studies involving human-derived induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), standardization means identifying the key environmental variables that influence downstream results, such as cell culture temperature and density, and then defining practical acceptance criteria to ensure these variables don’t compromise the integrity of the test. By taking such steps to increase reproducibility, we are on our path to seeing new cell culture-based NAMs become a regulatory standard.

Unfortunately, NAMs aren’t going to make things easier any time soon; rather, it’s only the beginning of a new host of challenges. Standardization isn’t cheap: dedicated professionals will still have to run or supervise a number of quality control tests to ensure that these novel models work as intended. And while we don’t need highly complex models that capture everything about the human body, we risk settling on models that unintentionally oversimplify certain biological conditions due to technological or knowledge limitations.

Where do NAMs create value?

Graham Craig, Chief Commercial Officer at VoxCell, explained that the value of NAMs lies in their ability to answer human-relevant questions earlier in the drug development process, rather than waiting for clinical trials to reveal critical safety results. By tackling such questions earlier, companies may be able to discover safe and effective drugs faster and at lower cost.

Craig described how there are four decision categories where NAMs can provide improvements: (1) target engagement, (2) functional efficacy, (3) liability identification, and (4) exposure and tissue interaction. In other words, NAMs can provide new insights into whether the drug binds in a human-relevant context, its downstream biological effects, potential side effects, and its ability to localize to the target tissue site. These decision categories enable us to pinpoint the problem the NAM seeks to address and evaluate whether it is well suited to that purpose, rather than chasing the unrealistic goal of crafting a broad NAM that captures everything about human biology.

While NAMs are well-positioned to bring about improved insights in these decision categories, at the end of the day, they are still just models, representations of reality with limitations governed by our assumptions. For example, artificial intelligence (AI) and other computational NAMs (in silico models) can enable rapid drug testing through simulations trained on real-world data. However, such improvements cannot come to fruition if these computational models are fraught with biases from the data collection process, or if these AI models are constructed as black boxes without any way to explain their predictions.

NAMs present an exciting opportunity, but we must still be mindful to acknowledge and address their limitations. An understanding of how such limitations affect our conclusions and how they might help us design further tests to address those limitations is just as important as the results themselves.

What are current examples of NAMs?

FluidForm Bio is using its FRESH bioprinting technique to create remarkable tissue constructs for use as NAMs. Dr. Andrew Lee, the company’s Co-Founder and Senior Scientist, shared how their cardiac drug discovery platform involves using human cells and extracellular matrix, creating a computational design of the tissue architecture, performing robotic biofabrication of human tissue, and finally measuring the 3D tissue.

By using bioprinting, they are able to create a variety of tissue shapes, including rings, strips, bands, and 3D ventricular structures, that are capable of beating like the heart. As a result, they are able to measure the spatial, not just temporal, behavior of the tissues. In one use case, they can induce arrhythmia in their bioprinted tissues and show a restoration of normal function using a typical lidocaine treatment. They can also structurally mimic cardiac disease states by computationally designing and fabricating fibrotic tissue.

Another interesting avenue for NAMs is tissue-on-a-chip devices. Alexandre Civiere, Sales and Business Manager at REVIVO BioSystems, showed us the company’s microfluidics platform, which consists of skin tissue and collagen made from human primary cells. This tissue is then placed inside an automated, programmable microfluidic device that continuously pumps a liquid in contact with it. By having this continuous flow, they can collect biomarkers released by the tissue over time for longitudinal studies.

Civiere explained that they can also create a wound in the epidermis and measure changes in the pro-inflammatory marker interleukin-6 (IL-6) over time, with IL-6 expected to decrease as the wound closes. Interestingly, they measure tissue permeability using caffeine to assess recovery of the skin’s barrier properties, since caffeine permeability should decrease as the skin regrows. Ultimately, one could use this model to test the behavior of different drugs in a reproducible, high-throughput setting.

While NAMs might be seen as just another umbrella term to describe recent advancements in tissue models, they are actually an important reminder that regulatory and reproducibility considerations must occur early in the design process. Technologies such as bioprinting may enable companies to create highly customized, engineered solutions for clients, but companies interested in influencing the NAMs field must understand how these bespoke choices would fare in a regulatory context. And the innovators who are currently thinking about NAMs have the potential to greatly impact the future of drug development: as Civiere mentioned, they’re effectively contributing to the creation of a new standard when the standard doesn’t already exist.

Where is the future of NAMs heading?

Dr. Pranav Joshi, Senior Scientist at Bioprinting Laboratories Inc., shared that customers told them the real burden was in the preparation process. Addressing this operational burden would help transform models from promising organoids to assay-ready NAMs. To achieve this, quality control and automation can make NAMs more efficient and less error-prone. In particular, Dr. Joshi says that quality control needs to be distributed throughout the organoid lifecycle, with each QC gate having predefined acceptance criteria and clear corrective action.

The future of NAMs, therefore, lies in streamlining, automating, and validating rigorous quality control processes for novel assays. Integrating these considerations into a product has far-reaching benefits by pushing the industry towards greater standardization and reproducibility, increasing assay reliability for customers, and actively shaping the future of regulation.

Join us for future events

As we have seen from our five expert panelists, the NAMs’ perspective is essential when thinking about the latest advancements in bioprinting, organ-on-a-chip, and AI technologies. NAMs call to our attention the need for fit-for-purpose models, as well as the need for a thorough consideration of a new assay’s complexity, limitations, biases, and cost. If we aren’t careful, these issues will overshadow the benefits that cutting-edge innovations promise. We invite you to continue exploring new perspectives in healthcare 3D printing with us by subscribing to the 3DHEALS newsletter and our YouTube channel. To watch the full event you can also check out our on-demand archive here.

@3dheals

Organ Chip Workflows_ Overcoming the Biggest Caveats Moderator Dr. Lowry Curley challenges speakers on why NAMs have not entered into #pharma workflow more routinely for #drugdiscovery #CiPA #FDA #iPSC #Toxicity Check out our latest event recap with video highlights: https://3dheals.com/event-recap-new-approach-methodologies-nams/ Full event on demand: https://3dheals.com/courses/new-approach-methodologies-from-theory-to-validation/ #NewApproachMethodologies #DrugDiscovery

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About the Author:

Peter Hsu

Peter Hsu is an editorial intern for 3DHEALS.  He is currently an undergraduate at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and studies bioengineering with a focus on cell and tissue engineering.  He is also minoring in computer science with interests in artificial intelligence and image processing.  Peter conducts research on using computer vision methods to analyze human tissue images and improve the robustness of machine learning workflows.  He is interested in the use of AI to assist tissue engineering and bioprinting research for medical applications.  He is passionate about science communication and leads STEM outreach lessons at schools in the central Illinois area.

Related Links:

Event Recap: Advancing 3D Surgical Planning

Communicating Your Science in the Bioprinting Space

Event Recap: 3D-Printed Devices In Orthopedics

Event Recap: Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing

Expert Corner: AI in Healthcare 3D Printing: The Future is Now

Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing (On Demand, 2025)

Event Recap: 3D Printed Pharmaceuticals

The post Event Recap: New Approach Methodologies (NAMs) appeared first on 3DHeals.

To create and build in 3D is to understand our world with greater complexity and richness. Over the years, 3D printing and visualization have captivated us and the imaginations of innovators worldwide. We have seen many incredible applications of this technology, but what brings these discussions to life are the people creating and being impacted by these changes. At our latest 3DHEALS event on Advancing 3D Surgical Planning, one of the field’s biggest challenges is realizing the entire clinical workflow. At that level, integrating 3D technologies isn’t just about the tools and gadgets – it’s also about the people who work in and depend on the clinical system. In this recap article, we’ll take a look at the main lessons we learned from our five expert panelists on how to actually put 3D into practice.

Building with Human-Centered Design

As AI takes its turn as a flashy marketing tactic, it will be important for innovators to build software with the thoughtfulness and attention to detail needed to bring actual value to users.  For Dr. Tim Van Cleynenbreugel, Co-Founder and CTO of Replasia, creating a software tool to work alongside the company’s 3D-printed titanium implant for hip dysplasia presented an opportunity to develop patient-specific products in a reproducible, scalable way.

The software, called HipStudio, enables users to conveniently perform anatomic measurements, perform simulations, and compare with healthy reference data. By designing software tools that support the creation and use of their 3D-printed implant, they can make this level of patient customization more accessible and easier for healthcare providers to adopt.

This type of software can ultimately help to lower the time, cost, and effort barriers that patient-specific devices typically present. However, they must be carefully designed with the human user in mind. What repetitive steps can the software perform, and when will the user want to manually intervene? What data should we show the user, and, importantly, what should be kept hidden to avoid information overload? How much responsibility should we place on users to catch errors, especially AI-generated ones?

While the 3D printing field is working to advance software integration into clinical workflows, addressing these critical questions distinguishes practical software from hype-driven, extraneous features.

Balancing Creativity and Reproducibility

Dr. Beatriz Dominguez Gonzalez, Global Market Manager for Materialise, recommends seeing beyond the print when figuring out how to turn 3D technologies into a routine, rather than a niche, practice. She suggests investing in a workflow that (1) selects the most complex cases that will provide significant and not just marginal benefits, (2) utilizes standardized segmentation protocols, and (3) ensures that 3D plans are aligned with the surgical schedule and not the other way around.

Incorporating 3D workflows into the clinical environment will require innovators to carefully consider design standardizations and constraints, without sacrificing the flexibility the technology promises. Not every hospital will have its own 3D expert with decades of experience, which means the restrictions we place on data quality, the sequence of steps, and the double-checks that must occur are integral parts of the product.

Innovation in this field will come from technologies that empower users to be creative and express their design ideas while simultaneously adhering to strict principles that prevent them from getting lost in the software’s complexity or from ending up with undesirable results.

Listening to an Ecosystem of People

For Dr. Mark Tan, a Radiologist and Clinical Lead of the Singapore General Hospital 3D Printing Centre, bringing people together is his craft. Dr. Tan describes the importance of creating diverse teams of engineers, radiographers, managers, and clinical leads to make the technology accessible to patients and providers. 

He describes several challenges in implementing 3D technologies in clinical settings. For example, creating 3D models for surgical planning involves acquiring high-quality medical imaging scans and potentially combining imaging modalities to capture the relevant spatial and temporal details. It also means having someone with computer-aided design (CAD) expertise and a person with an understanding of different printing materials.

3D planning and printing affect an entire ecosystem of individuals within the healthcare system, and innovators must anticipate how their product will affect each one of these people. Listening to their needs and preferences is what ultimately shapes a product. The customer isn’t just the patient or the surgeon; it’s also all the individuals the product depends on to get it to the end user.

Sharing the 3D Mindset

Rashi Gupta, a 3D Printing Engineer at SSM Health Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital, points out three major obstacles: (1) there can be a disconnect between doctors and engineers due to differences in terminology and knowledge, (2) sometimes people are unaware that the 3D lab exists, and (3) there is resistance to reimbursement for surgical planning since such plans aren’t physical products.

One way Gupta addresses these challenges is by knowing how to educate people on 3D technologies and bridging the language gap between different specialists. By taking the time to learn more about the clinical perspective as an engineer, she describes how she has a better understanding of how to bring people together around this technology and how we can better train future leaders in the field.

Innovators will need to consider how their product also requires an educational component to help stakeholders understand the device’s significance and how to use it. 3D technologies are rapidly expanding to a point where an interdisciplinary background is needed to understand the “3D mindset.” Translating innovation into a language that people from different fields can resonate with is part of the equation for user adoption.

Bringing Real Value to Clinicians

One of the major goals of Dr. David Pearlstone, CEO of DICOM Director, is to achieve a human digital twin that will allow clinicians, patients, and families to understand a person’s specific medical condition through computer simulations and visualizations. For Dr. Pearlstone, the predictive ability of such twins will enable greater insights and benefits, such as understanding how a tumor mass will grow over time.

While AI may play a significant role in the future of predictive digital twins, it will be up to humans to decide which predictions will be useful in clinical practice and which are just noise. Predictions may provide more information to the clinician, but many will shrug their shoulders as to what it means if there isn’t good evidence to back it up.

Dr. Pearlstone envisions a future in which digital twins improve clinicians’ practice of healthcare through predictive insights, and it will be important for 3D specialists to decide how those predictions fit into the overall clinical workflow.

Continue to Explore with Us

This event has shown us that while 3D technologies for surgical planning are here, their integration into the clinical workflow still has many unsolved hurdles. Through our expert panelists, we are beginning to understand what this integration might look like and the ways the field can actually fulfill the promises it makes. Continue to explore with us on this journey by registering for our live webinars and subscribing to our newsletter.

About the Author:

Peter Hsu

Peter Hsu is an editorial intern for 3DHEALS.  He is currently an undergraduate at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and studies bioengineering with a focus on cell and tissue engineering.  He is also minoring in computer science with interests in artificial intelligence and image processing.  Peter conducts research on using computer vision methods to analyze human tissue images and improve the robustness of machine learning workflows.  He is interested in the use of AI to assist tissue engineering and bioprinting research for medical applications.  He is passionate about science communication and leads STEM outreach lessons at schools in the central Illinois area.

Related Links:

Communicating Your Science in the Bioprinting Space

Event Recap: 3D-Printed Devices In Orthopedics

Event Recap: Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing

Expert Corner: AI in Healthcare 3D Printing: The Future is Now

Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing (On Demand, 2025)

Event Recap: 3D Printed Pharmaceuticals

The post Event Recap: Advancing 3D Surgical Planning appeared first on 3DHeals.

On a warm spring afternoon in Leuven, Belgium, I sat down next to a stranger at a medical conference and asked what he did for a living. Quinten Veerman’s answer stopped me: he is a Technical Physician, a 3D specialist at OCON Orthopedic Center in the Netherlands. I had never heard the title before. By the end of the day, I had met a dozen more engineers who see patients, or clinicians who understand the physics of the tools they prescribe. These are practitioners who exist, formally and legally, at an intersection that the rest of the world’s healthcare systems have never bothered to pave.

A Profession the World Is Yet To Copy

The Technical Physician is a Dutch invention, born of a straightforward observation: hospitals everywhere had acquired extraordinary technologies, but few on the clinical staff truly understood them. The degree, developed at the University of Twente in 2003, was the Netherlands’ answer to that gap. More than a thousand graduates have followed since.

More precisely, a Technical Physician occupies a unique niche at the intersection of advanced engineering and direct patient care, working within hospital departments such as the ICU, operating rooms, and radiology to independently perform complex diagnostic procedures, surgical interventions, and AI-driven, personalized treatments (such as 3D-printed devices). Students complete an intensive six-year Master of Science program in Technical Medicine, offered through collaborations between Dutch technical universities and academic medical centers. The program integrates rigorous engineering theory, medical data science, and hands-on clinical rotations, training graduates to safely bridge the gap between complex technological innovation and the human body.

The gap it addresses isn’t unique to the Netherlands. It exists in every hospital system that has adopted imaging, robotics, or digital planning tools. Elsewhere in the world, individuals like Rashi Gupta and Dr. Tristan Ramcharan (a pediatric cardiologist I met at the same conference) bridge this divide through personal initiative rather than structured training. There are many of them in the 3DHEALS community. But self-taught hybrids are the exceptions. The Netherlands made them the rule.

One reason the model hasn’t spread is perhaps structural: the Netherlands had to adapt its national laws, establishing Article 36a of the BIG Act to grant these hybrid clinician-technologists independent authority to treat patients. As medical technology advances and healthcare complexity grows, the gap the Technical Physician fills is widening, not closing. Which makes it harder to explain why no other country has followed.

The conference that brought them here was hosted by Materialise and the kind of gathering a company can convene says something about the depth of the ecosystem it has built.

Materialise: From 3D Printing to 3D Solutions

Founded in 1990 with a single 3D printer, Materialise was built on a medical ambition from the start. Co-founders Fried Vancraen and Hilde Ingelaere wanted to be a dominant force in healthcare, a goal that would take three decades to prove. CEO Brigitte de Vet-Veithen said it plainly in a recent podcast with me: “The second shift that we’ve gone through at Materialize for the last 10 years in the medical arena …(is that) we’re not a 3D printing company anymore. Our customers don’t see us as a 3D printing or 3D technology company anymore. They see us as a person bringing or a partner to bring HIP solutions, shoulder solutions, cranial maxillofacial solutions, and structural heart solutions, but they don’t care what we 3D print. The technology doesn’t really matter to them. They need the right solution for their patient. So we are a medical company.”

That clarification matters.

In 2025, the company’s medical division helped more than 70,000 patients and had cumulatively produced over 700,000 patient-specific models, guides, and implants. Its Mimics imaging software has analyzed more than six million patient scans across hospitals, academic institutions, and device companies in 21 countries. About half of Materialise’s revenue now comes from its medical division — a share that has nearly doubled over four years, as the company has steadily shed broader ambitions and concentrated on the one market where 35 years of regulatory and clinical infrastructure are genuinely difficult to replicate.

That focus was not always obvious. The HQ in Leuven has a startup vibe that surprises first-time visitors. A flat org chart, an informal culture, and founder Fried Vancraen walking the conference floor like any other attendee. But the history visible there includes commercial experiments that didn’t survive: furniture, artistic lamps, consumer products that tested the technology’s limits and found them. What outlasted that period of exploration was a sharper thesis: scalable personalized surgical care.

Today, instead of pushing 3D printing into every hospital and procedure, Materialise is integrating its point solutions: surgical planning software, manufacturing services, and novel device creation as a connected system rather than separate offerings. The company calls its strategy a “Slow Revolution”, transformative in potential, gradual in adoption. The evidence suggests it has been patient enough to wait.

What is memorable about the Materialise conference wasn’t just about the technology; it was the people in the room. Several generations of hybrid physician-engineer practitioners from many different healthcare systems, countries, and with different journeys and stories to share.

The Community: Off The Zoom

Before the pandemic, 3DHEALS had more than 30 volunteer community managers hosting events in over 20 cities worldwide. The people who showed up shared something: a conviction that 3D printing wasn’t just a manufacturing technology, but a different way of imagining future medicine. That future also requires bridging the gap between physicians (or healthcare system) and engineers (or technology).

Being back in a room with familiar faces and new ones in Leuven was a reminder of something six years of Zoom calls had made easy to forget. The idea that meaningful change tends to start with understanding and trust.

This brings me back to the concept of Technical Physician, an entirely new kind of healthcare workforce that has demonstrated its value and established trust in the Netherlands. This also raises the question of why no other country has taken a similar step.

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The Blip Test

Technology has made surgical care faster and more personalized, but it has also widened the gap between what the tools can do and who knows how to use them. At conferences like this one, audiences are routinely awed by what presenters achieve, only to quietly recognize afterward how difficult it would be to replicate at their own institutions. Good tools need educated users. That gap doesn’t close by installing better software.

Consider what happens if Materialise vanishes entirely: its FDA clearances, its hospital software installations, its manufacturing capacity, its workflow expertise. A significant portion of the world’s 3D surgical planning will stop working. The field will be disrupted.

Now consider what happens if the people with know-hows at the hospitals vanish. Not disrupted. Paralyzed. The hardware still works. The software still runs. But there is no one in the room have the clinical and the engineering fluency to take responsibility for the outcome. The technology becomes a very expensive prop.

That asymmetry is the real finding from Leuven. Materialise is irreplaceable in many ways. The people using the tools are the other half of the equation. Good tools need educated users. That gap doesn’t close by installing better software.

Healthcare systems everywhere are acquiring hardware, installing software, and building 3D labs. What they have not done is train an updated workforce that can sit at the intersection and own the clinical outcome. The Netherlands has been tackling that problem for two decades. The rest of the world is still waiting for someone to tell them it’s an option.

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Related Links:

Episode 114: Interview With Brigitte de Vet-Veithen, CEO of Materialise

Episode 113: How 3D Printing Explains the Unexplainable With Dr. Tristan Ramcharan

The post The Technical Physician Will See You Now appeared first on 3DHeals.

To wrap up our year at 3DHEALS, we dug deeper into Design for 3D Technologies at our latest event. We listened to the stories of four entrepreneurs and designers who are making tremendous strides in healthcare 3D printing. Design for additive manufacturing (DfAM) is rooted in software, and we got a close-up look at the latest advancements in CAD modeling as well as the regulatory challenges innovators face despite these in-silico simulation platforms. We also had the opportunity to see some stunning 3D prints, including a personalized seating solution for patients with cerebral palsy, and to learn about the ways automation and AI are transforming the industry. Read our event recap below, and watch event highlights below. You can also view the whole event on 3DHEALS Courses. The proceeds from our courses help us curate more similar future events.

How are experts creating custom 3D-printed products for patients?

Most people hardly think twice about the chair they’re sitting on. What’s more to think about? A chair is a chair. However, for Alexander Geht, Founder and CEO of Testa-Seat, seeing beyond the seeming mundaneness of sitting has led his company to create incredible designs made possible by 3D printing.

Geht, an Industrial Designer, is creating seating solutions for children with cerebral palsy and other physical disabilities. For these patients, chairs must be specifically designed to support their bodies and avoid further skeletal deformations properly. The lack of proper seating can interfere with day-to-day activities, including eating, bathing, playing, and learning, leading to developmental delays.

Specialized seats on the market tend to be bulky and hard to move around, yet they’re pretty expensive to buy for all the different places kids need to sit. Off-the-shelf seats also don’t offer the right shape to precisely fit a growing kid’s body, leading to suboptimal solutions.

Geht’s approach has been to leverage digitization and 3D printing to create custom seating solutions that meet the unique needs of patients, with a custom-fit, lightweight design that goes wherever the kid goes. Caregivers can provide a few measurements with a ruler, work with the designers to make some fine-tuned adjustments, and receive their child’s 3D-printed seat from a company that’s already bringing much joy to many families, clinicians, and children.

What’s particularly important about Geht’s approach is his values in working closely with families and patients to deliver 3D printing innovations that specifically meet their needs. For example, families especially wanted designs that had a small footprint so the seat could be moved around easily, and Geht delivers. Testa–Seat is compact, easy to carry, and even small enough to fit into a stroller.

Geht describes how the company has been growing alongside the kids, continuing to work with their users for many years. Some might see 3D printing as a prototyping technology – make it and throw it away – but there’s real impact when we see 3D printing as a technology that helps us form long-term partnerships with the patients and clients these products are designed to help.

Design is two-fold: there’s the technicality of 3D printing custom products, but there’s also the need to listen. The perspectives of families and patients must always be the number one consideration behind a 3D-printed product, and genuine innovation lies in this meticulous attention to client needs, not what’s hot in the news. And Geht’s work is a clear example of this human-centered design in action.

How are innovators designing multi-material 3D prints?

To create the future of 3D printing, innovators need the right design tools to bring their visions to life. Dr. Robert MacCurdy, Assistant Professor in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Colorado Boulder, describes that while 3D printers are capable of fabricating multi-material prints, the software has been lagging. 

Multi-material printing has the potential to improve 3D-printed anatomical models and implants by mimicking the diverse mechanical properties of human tissues through the combination of multiple material types. However, while printers may be able to fabricate objects composed of two materials blended in a spatially varying pattern, many traditional computer-aided design (CAD) tools aren’t well-suited for designers to specify how the material type should vary internally within a single object. 

In response to this need, Dr. MacCurdy and his lab developed OpenVCAD. This free software package enables designers to create multi-material geometries with just a few lines of code. Users can import CAD files, DICOM images, and more into the program to specify the object’s geometry, then use Python to describe the spatial variation in material types. Ultimately, the program outputs files that can be sent to inkjet and toolpath printers for fabrication.

Developing software tools that enable designers to create more sophisticated prints and are readily accessible to all will allow 3D printers to be used to their fullest potential. Making such works open source for the community to use will help pave the way for many more people to become designers and push beyond the boundaries of conventional CAD tools.

Creating resources that allow others to bring their designs to life and are available for all to use is having a tremendous impact on the 3D field by accelerating innovation.

However, such tools must be crafted to be easily used by individuals from a variety of backgrounds, especially those with a vision of what they want to create but only entry-level experience with coding and computational design software. Creating tools centered on accessibility will help to garner increased attention for multi-material technology and increase the adoption of multi-material prints with enhanced mechanical properties.

What regulatory hurdles are 3D printing designers facing?

Matthew Shomper, Founder/Principal Consultant of Not a Robot Engineering and CTO of Allumin8, shares how some metal implants for orthopedic applications fail to restore the mechanical behaviors seen in healthy bone.

For example, Shomper showed how inserting the traditional femoral implant into the bone for a hip replacement shifts the stresses onto the metal rather than the outside of the bone. This causes the bone to experience mechanical forces differently compared to healthy cases, which can lead to complications after surgery and create more problems for patients.

Shomper demonstrates that the mechanical interactions between novel implants and the bone can be modeled computationally, especially with software such as nTop, to rapidly design better solutions. However, Shomper notes that there are still significant regulatory hurdles since it can be hard to convince regulators that the overly high stiffness of traditional metal parts isn’t a good standard of comparison for restoring the mechanical behavior of the bone. Instead, a less stiff but more carefully designed implant that matches native forces is more effective.

While there can be uncertainty around the regulation of 3D-printed devices and the validation of customized products, innovators must hold strong to their beliefs that the usual way of doing things can be changed for the better. It’s this determination to bring new, disruptive technologies to fruition that has led to Allumin8’s recent FDA clearance and will push 3D printing into reality for patients.

How are medical 3D printing experts using automation and AI?

Automation, particularly with AI, has been one of the highlights of this past year. Nathan Shirley, Experience and Design Lead at HP, works with companies that use HP printers to create automation software that enables rapid, scalable design of 3D-printed parts. 
Shirley describes his work with the company Radii Devices to help create a custom, streamlined software solution that allows users to easily input measurements from Radii’s prosthetic socket models and turn them into 3D models that are ready to print. In just a few clicks, clinicians can get Radii’s optimized sockets ready for printing with less manual work.

Automation is critical for companies to create custom 3D-printed medical devices at scale. After all, a custom print that takes months to design and fabricate isn’t sustainable and ultimately won’t serve patients in the future, even if the single print brings tangible medical benefits.

In the coming years, 3D printing innovators will have to wrestle with the question of balancing automation and human connection. AI will provide the field with opportunities to create custom parts at unprecedented production levels, removing the need for extensive manual labor such as segmenting anatomical structures and fine-tuning parameters by eye.

However, it will be important for innovators to hold onto the spirit of 3D printing: to design devices with a specific patient in mind with thoughtful consideration of their needs. 3D printing, at its core, must continue to show patients that their individual needs matter and remain grounded as a technology meant to bring people together to create personalized solutions rather than pull designers away from clients in favor of scalability.

For Nathan Shirley, AI has been an opportunity to automate the coding of basic building blocks, so he can focus on bringing creativity and care to the designs he works on with his clients. It’s this balance that all innovators must strive to find in this new world of computation.

Looking forward to healthcare 3D printing in 2026

Our speakers highlight the incredible artistry and creativity behind 3D printing. And it’s these innovative designs that will help pave the way for solutions to longstanding challenges with traditional devices and treatments. All of this gives us much hope for the new year as we kick it off with Life in 3D (3DHEALS2026) an in-person event that will take place in San Francisco on January 11th Sunday before JPM 2026. Subscribe to 3DHEALS and join our 2026 events live to stay up-to-date on healthcare 3D printing.

Glossary

• Human-centered design (HCD): a framework for strategically incorporating customer needs into the product design process from the very beginning. See more here.
• Computer-aided design (CAD): creating 3D models and performing simulations using specialized software.
• Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM): a standard for medical imaging data, such as CT and MRI scans.
• Matterassumbly:OpenVCAD – related publication is here.

About the Author:

Peter Hsu

Peter Hsu is an editorial intern for 3DHEALS.  He is currently an undergraduate at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and studies bioengineering with a focus on cell and tissue engineering.  He is also minoring in computer science with interests in artificial intelligence and image processing.  Peter conducts research on using computer vision methods to analyze human tissue images and improving the robustness of machine learning workflows.  He is interested in the use of AI to assist tissue engineering and bioprinting research for medical applications.  He is passionate about science communication and leads STEM outreach lessons at schools in the central Illinois area.

Relevant links:

Event Recap: What are the latest updates in 3D technologies for pediatric cardiology?
Event Recap: 3D-Printed Devices In Orthopedics

Event Recap: Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing

Expert Corner: AI in Healthcare 3D Printing: The Future is Now

Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing (On Demand, 2025)

Event Recap: 3D Printed Pharmaceuticals

Event Recap: Where is 3D printing for orthotics and prosthetics (O&P) headed next?

The post What are the latest design innovations in healthcare 3D printing? appeared first on 3DHeals.

Our recent event brought together key innovators to discuss the profound impact of 3D technologies on pediatric cardiology. We dove into how 3D printing, augmented reality (AR), and virtual reality (VR) are transforming pre-surgical planning, intraoperative care, and patient outcomes, drawing on insights from five industry and clinical leaders. These technologies are providing clinicians, patients, and their families with a new dimension of understanding, enhancing the accuracy of pre-surgical planning, refining intraoperative procedures, and improving patient outcomes and education. Here’s a recap of our event, now available on-demand in 3DHEALS Courses.

How are 3D printing innovators using creativity to advance pediatric cardiology?

Medical 3D printing is an art form, enriched by the creative expression of 3D printing innovators and the growing landscape of tools to create in 3D. There’s no doubt that 3D-printed anatomical models must be true to a patient’s anatomy for them to be practically useful, but, as Nicholas Jacobson showed us, it takes an artistic viewpoint to make these prints a reality.

Jacobson, Co-Founder of Tangible Industries, has been using his training as an architect and artist to inform his innovations in 3D printing for pediatric cardiology and other areas of medicine.

One project he’s worked on is printing absolutely stunning models of blood flow through the heart using 4D flow cardiovascular magnetic resonance (4DCMR). Using a Stratasys PolyJet printer, the hearts are fabricated such that each voxel (or 3D pixel) can be a different color, enabling Jacobson to create models that show blood flow velocity as streamlines printed as a beautiful gradation of colors. This allows clinicians to visualize dynamic flow over time in 3D, even while holding a static model.

Cardiac 3D printing is now moving towards creating physical representations of these more complex forms of imaging data, enabling clinicians to visualize areas of concerning flow before a procedure. However, turning new imaging modalities into usable prints isn’t easy, as Jacobson’s paper shows that printing blood flow is both a scientific and artistic challenge.

The artistic choices of color saturation, printing material opacity, and blood flow line thickness all play a factor in how easily a viewer can understand what’s going on in a print. After all, it’s the role of the artist to figure out how best to color an artwork so that their intended message is conveyed to the audience, and medical 3D printing is no different.

Fundamentally, 3D printing innovators are artists. How do we take a patient’s heart and turn it into a model that clearly tells clinicians and patients its story? What do we want viewers to feel and see? For Jacobson, leveraging this artistic side of medical 3D printing is leading him to create models that go beyond static anatomy, showing us that there are many more unexplored avenues if we take a look at the field from a different perspective.

How is augmented reality (AR) transforming pediatric cardiology?

One key advantage of 3D modeling is its role in patient and family education. Clinicians can now use 3D models of a pediatric patient’s heart as a rich visual representation to more easily explain complicated medical information to parents, which helps to alleviate concerns and keep parents informed.

Dr. Ravi Ashwath, Professor of Pediatrics at Baylor College of Medicine and Division Chief of Pediatric Cardiology at Christus Children’s Hospital, shared one of his studies comparing 3D-printed models, 3D virtual models, and 2D imaging for explaining cardiac anatomy to patients and family members. The study finds that both types of 3D models – printed and virtual – improved patient knowledge of cardiac anatomy and were more preferred compared to viewing 2D echocardiograms. However, the difference between printed and virtual models wasn’t as clear.

3D virtual models can have a tremendous impact on patient education, serving as a lower-cost alternative because they do not require printing physical materials. Dr. Ashwath described their workflow for efficiently delivering virtual models: users can scan QR codes to view augmented reality (AR) models of a patient’s heart directly on their smartphones.

While not yet used in routine clinical work, this QR code system could one day provide all parents of pediatric heart patients with virtual heart models that improve their understanding of their child’s condition and reduce anxiety about entering a world filled with medical jargon and unfamiliar concepts.

(Watch the full video to get the QR codes.)

Dr. Ashwath shows the power of making 3D modeling easily accessible to more people. As 3D models play a larger role in the clinic, it will be critical to make this technology more accessible so that as many individuals as possible can benefit from it. How can we make the workflow from imaging to AR as efficient as possible? How will we increase access to devices for viewing these models, especially in resource-limited settings?

How is mixed reality improving surgical outcomes for pediatric cardiology?

3D printing innovators know how to bring people together. Look no further than Dr. Shafkat Anwar, Co-Founder and Medical Director of the UCSF Center for Advanced 3D+ Technologies (CA3D+). Since the founding of CA3D+ in 2018, Dr. Anwar has brought experts across the university’s expansive clinical network under one umbrella to collaborate on making 3D technologies a reality for patients.

Dr. Anwar described a case of a 5-year-old pediatric patient having a pseudoaneurysm and only a single ventricle, with poor ventricular function and seizures. Even under tight time constraints, Dr. Anwar demonstrated how he used the EchoPixel platform to turn the patient’s CT scans into a mixed-reality model, allowing him to view the patient’s anatomy in 3D and create virtual cut planes to plan where the surgeons needed to intervene.

Collaborating with the surgeons in the operating room, Dr. Anwar helped them plan out the surgery using the models. They were ultimately able to remove the several clots they had identified. The patient’s cardiac function recovered, and the patient left the hospital in two weeks, even though they initially estimated a 50% chance of death in the OR. This was just one of many stunning examples of how Dr. Anwar has brought 3D technologies to fruition, augmenting the traditional surgical workflow to improve outcomes.

By bringing clinicians together to use CA3D+ technologies, Dr. Anwar exemplifies what it means to be a 3D innovator: bringing people together to disrupt traditional medical workflows and explore the potential of new technologies to transform lives. Now, he’s celebrating the recent opening of a 2nd 3D printing lab to expand CA3D+’s reach and is working on helping others start their own labs by providing recommendations in a soon-to-be-released paper.

You can read more in his review on 3D printing and chapter on 3D modeling.

Where is 3D modeling for pediatric cardiology headed next?

Dr. Jenny Zablah is no stranger to bringing augmented reality (AR) into the operating room. Dr. Zablah, an Interventional Congenital Cardiologist and Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Colorado School of Medicine, and her team have printed over 800 hearts for patient experience and education, and now, she’s using AR to guide surgical procedures.

Using the HoloLens, she described viewing 3D models of a heart and an implant valve during a surgery, which were then projected onto another monitor for the primary surgeon to view. Dr. Zablah could then manipulate the models for the surgical team, helping to guide the surgery from the side to maintain a level of separation between AR and the traditional surgical procedure.

Figuring out how to successfully integrate 3D modeling into practice is no easy feat, but Dr. Zablah is making significant strides to bring this technology into the OR. The evolving landscape of AR platforms means innovators must carefully consider the lifespans of the devices they invest in, especially amid product discontinuations and the rise of newer, more sophisticated devices. The weight and unfamiliarity of wearing such headsets during surgery are also critical factors.

Another challenge will be to integrate different forms of imaging modalities into virtual 3D modeling. For example, Dr. Zablah showed combining live echocardiograms with CT scans in virtual reality (VR) using the Artiness platform, which can be used during a procedure. Ensuring proper alignment across modalities in real time, especially given imaging noise and differences in equipment across hospitals, will be a significant obstacle.

It will be helpful moving forward to create shared, standardized protocols that many institutions can use to ensure the highest quality in their 3D models. Dr. Zablah has already contributed extensively to this effort through a review of VR for echocardiograms and several case studies. Having an open-source library of hearts, stents, and other models that specialists can easily augment for each case can also help to accelerate adoption. For example, having a library of implantable pulmonary valve frame models can help more hospitals use VR for patient screening.

Finding ways to implement workflows and share models across multiple institutions in a cost-effective, timely manner will be essential to advancing 3D technologies in pediatric cardiology. Going from zero to what Dr. Zablah has achieved at any new hospital will require anticipating ways each step in the AR workflow could go wrong and having a reliable set of solutions. This scalability challenge won’t be easy, but Dr. Zablah’s work is already paving the way forward.

What 3D modeling tools are being used for pediatric cardiology?

For 3D modeling to be successfully implemented in the clinic, we need robust software tools that are easy for clinicians to pick up and start using. Automatic segmentation is a game-changer in this field, bringing 3D models to patients faster with less hassle. Listen below as Sarah Ptashnik, Medical Account Manager at Materialise, shared how 3D modeling is being used in pediatric cardiology to provide models for surgical planning and patient education.

What we’re thinking

Thinking and innovating in 3D requires both science and art, shaped by strong collaboration, personal drive, and the ability to touch the hearts of patients and their families. It is truly incredible to witness the impacts these speakers have had on the lives of so many patients and how 3D technologies are playing an increasingly influential role in the standard of care. We are excited to see what our speakers will do next, so join us live at our upcoming events to stay up to date in this field by subscribing to 3DHEALS.

Glossary

• 4DCMR = 4D flow cardiac magnetic resonance, an imaging technique used to visualize blood flow
• AR = augmented reality, 3D models that are overlayed onto a real-world camera feed
• VR = virtual reality, 3D models presented in an immersive environment
• CT = computed tomography

About the Author:

Peter Hsu

Peter Hsu is an editorial intern for 3DHEALS.  He is currently an undergraduate at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and studies bioengineering with a focus on cell and tissue engineering.  He is also minoring in computer science with interests in artificial intelligence and image processing.  Peter conducts research on using computer vision methods to analyze human tissue images and improving the robustness of machine learning workflows.  He is interested in the use of AI to assist tissue engineering and bioprinting research for medical applications.  He is passionate about science communication and leads STEM outreach lessons at schools in the central Illinois area.

Relevant links:

Event Recap: 3D-Printed Devices In Orthopedics

Event Recap: Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing

Expert Corner: AI in Healthcare 3D Printing: The Future is Now

Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing (On Demand, 2025)

Event Recap: 3D Printed Pharmaceuticals

Event Recap: Where is 3D printing for orthotics and prosthetics (O&P) headed next?

The post What are the latest updates in 3D technologies for pediatric cardiology? appeared first on 3DHeals.

At our event on 3D printing for orthotics and prosthetics (O&P), we had the opportunity to hear from four leading clinical experts and engineers who are creating the future of this field. We discussed innovations in prosthetic legs, UCBLs, ankle-foot orthoses (AFOs), and many other incredible devices for pediatric and adult patients. We also took an inside look at state-of-the-art 3D printers, as well as everything you need to know about using dyes to color 3D printed parts. So, where is 3D printing for O&P headed next? Here’s the recap of our event, which you can now watch on 3DHEALS courses.

What’s the secret to success in 3D printing? Look no further than Michael Schmitt from Prosthetic Plus.

3D printing shines in repeatability. With the increasing digitization of O&P, it’s easier than ever to make adjustments to past prints through software and create a new device for the patient at incredible speeds.

Michael Schmitt, Lead Digital Designer and a Certified Prosthetist-Orthotist at Prosthetic Plus, shared how vital repeatability has been in his 3D printing workflow. One use case he showed us was a dual material TPU and PA12 Rigid prosthetic leg they 3D printed for a pediatric patient. The patient absolutely loved using the device, and by the time they needed a new one, they could make the device bigger and have it printed again, making it a breeze for the patient’s physician and getting the child back to playing again.

There’s no doubt that repeatability is essential: when centralized fabrication experts, such as Schmitt, work with their partners, getting prints right again and again is key to building trust in the 3D printing process. With any new technology, making the process as pain-free and reliable as possible for physicians and patients is central to what has made Schmitt successful in this field.

Yet, while 3D printing shines in repeatability, it’s the people who put their faith in this technology that bring adaptability to the table. Schmitt described working late and pouring tons of effort into manually pulling check sockets by hand before he got into 3D printing. But his turn to 100% digitization and 3D printing completely changed his career – and the lives of his patients’, too.

Now, it’s astounding to see the number of different 3D-printed cases Schmitt has done, from a variety of foot orthotics printed in TPU to life-changing printed fingers and hands. 3D printers – and even AI – doesn’t know how to turn a completely new problem with vastly different sets of constraints into a viable solution, but Schmitt does. And it’s this clockwork adaptability of 3D printing innovators to make 180 degree pivots in order to meet the needs of patients that brings the human touch into an era of increasing automation and technology integration.

Integrating 3D printing into more educational programs, increasing its accessibility to clients outside of engineering, and building strong partnerships between physicians and 3D printing experts will be essential for cultivating the adaptability factor that the technology on its own doesn’t provide. And, while 3D printing has made Schmitt’s (and his client’s) lives much easier, you’ll still find him pouring his efforts into experimenting with new, creative prosthetic designs, just like his early years in O&P. It’s this drive that’s moving the field forward.

How is 3D printing impacting orthotics and prosthetics in the clinic? Here’s an example from Tara Wright, Gillette Children’s Hospital

The case studies from our clinicians are always truly astounding. Tara Wright, a Certified and Licensed Prosthetist-Orthotist at Gillette Children’s Specialty Healthcare, described a patient with cerebral palsy who needed a new UCBL orthosis. This plastic insert provides support for the heel and arch of the foot.

Using the traditional workflow of manually creating the orthosis by shaping heated plastic sheets, a new UCBL was made, but the patient described how it just didn’t feel the same as their old one. To solve the problem, Wright outlined how they designed a new hybrid workflow: using plaster to model the old UCBL, performing digital scanning to capture the model, and 3D printing the new device.

And when the patient tried them on, it was a perfect fit. Wright said it was the “easiest fit of my life as a clinician.”

While we’ve discussed the benefits of point-of-care 3D printing in the past, it’s essential to consider the trade-offs between streamlining and flexibility. Making the entire 3D printing process as optimized as possible for clinicians is critical for adoption, but that also means certain aspects of the process become set in stone, making it challenging to adjust steps on the fly.

After all, it’s hard to make 3D printing do what you want “with a single push of a button” when clinicians are still figuring out how to incorporate 3D printing into the myriad of unique patient needs and constraints. For Wright, creating a hybrid plaster molding and 3D printing workflow was necessary, not just the ideal digital-only O&P that we often dream of.

Wright pointed out that working with third-party service bureaus to handle printing has been beneficial, as such companies typically have a wide range of printers that the hospital can experiment with, providing the hospital with flexibility to change its workflow without much hassle. This way, the hospital doesn’t have to make the risky investment of purchasing an in-house printer that may not work as expected.

And so the solution to this efficiency-flexibility tradeoff really does lie in communication and education. It’s easy to silo people into those who are 3D printing experts and those who aren’t, but if hospitals must rely on third parties to streamline the process, there needs to be individuals on all sides who can bridge the gap and speak each other’s language.

Wright has nailed it down – understanding the critical needs of patients as a clinician and knowing how to effectively communicate that knowledge into 3D prints that precisely meet the needs of the end user. How to easily teach (and not just expect upfront) more people to communicate with a certain level of shared understanding will be one of the most significant prerequisites for advancing 3D printing in O&P.

What 3D printers are used for O&P? What post-processing steps are needed? HP and DyeMansion have the answers.

The advances in 3D printing hardware are genuinely incredible. David Johnson, Lead Healthcare Application Engineer at HP (Multi-Jet Fusion), and Emilie Simpson, Senior Application Engineer at DyeMansion, talked about how the two companies are powering the future of 3D printing for O&P with state-of-the-art printers and post-processing tools.

Creating a controlled environment for O&P printing is essential, and it’ll be interesting to be on the look out for when AI doesn’t just monitor the print environment for errors but also controls the printer itself to make corrections. While AI + 3D printers are still in the works, HP is leading the charge with thermal sensing printers that adjust on the fly. Check out the awesome demo video of HP’s multi-jet fusion printer below.

However, it’s more than just the printing. For O&P, Simpson noted that color is crucial for patient acceptance of the device, as many patients feel more comfortable wearing a device that matches their preferences. Simpson described how DyeMasion has been innovating in the post-processing steps of 3D printing, which include adding color that lasts and is safe for patients. 

What we’re thinking

We witnessed some incredible 3D printing technology and clinical cases at this O&P event – the positive impact this technology is having on patients is truly inspiring. As our speakers have shown, it’ll be important for everyone in the field to consider adaptability and effective communication when designing the 3D printing workflows of the future. Join us to continue the conversation by signing up for our newsletter and attending our live webinars.

Mini-Glossary

• O&P = orthotics (support the body) and prosthetics (replace missing limbs)
• TPU = thermoplastic polyurethane, a material known for its flexibility
• PA12 = polyamide 12, a type of nylon
• UCBL = a type of foot orthotic named after the University of California Biomechanics Laboratory

About the Author:

Peter Hsu

Peter Hsu is an editorial intern for 3DHEALS.  He is currently an undergraduate at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and studies bioengineering with a focus on cell and tissue engineering.  He is also minoring in computer science with interests in artificial intelligence and image processing.  Peter conducts research on using computer vision methods to analyze human tissue images and improving the robustness of machine learning workflows.  He is interested in the use of AI to assist tissue engineering and bioprinting research for medical applications.  He is passionate about science communication and leads STEM outreach lessons at schools in the central Illinois area.

Relevant links:

Event Recap: 3D-Printed Devices In Orthopedics

Event Recap: Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing

Expert Corner: AI in Healthcare 3D Printing: The Future is Now

Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing (On Demand, 2025)

Event Recap: 3D Printed Pharmaceuticals

The post Where is 3D printing for orthotics and prosthetics (O&P) headed next? appeared first on 3DHeals.

It’s the dream: fabricating whatever pill a patient needs, anywhere you want, and just in time. And even though it’s been over 10 years since the last (and only) FDA-approved 3D-printed drug was introduced, innovators aren’t giving up on making this dream a reality. At our latest 3DHEALS event, we looked at why this application of 3D printing (3DP) continues to hold high hopes from four leaders in the field. Three incredible printing systems were discussed, focusing on leveraging 3DP’s ability to create personalized compound drugs using room-temperature paste extrusion, blister/capsule filling, and other cutting-edge technologies. We’re also exploring the regulations and metrology standards, paving the way for reliable, decentralized manufacturing at pharmacies worldwide. Here’s the recap, with the recording now live on 3DHEALS courses.

FABRX: Open Science and Clinical Impact

In 2014, there was considerable skepticism about printing medicines in hospitals. Now, Dr. Alvaro Goyanes, CEO and Co-Founder of FABRX, described how his company has been involved in over 30 clinical trials at various hospitals, published the first article describing a 3D printer being implemented at a community pharmacy, and is even looking to send pharmaceutical 3D printers into space.

FABRX is designing its M3DIMAKER system, a printer with semi-solid extrusion, fused deposition modeling, and direct powder extrusion capabilities for printing custom polypills. These compounded drugs are intended to eliminate the need for patients to take a laundry list of drugs by combining them into a single medication, improving consistency among patients in following their prescription.

What’s truly remarkable about the company is its scale of published scientific research and clinical collaboration. Enthusiasts interested in drug 3D printing should check out the science that FABRX has shared over the years. For example, Dr. Goyanes and colleagues describe the methods and results behind printing single-dose capsules that combine a breast cancer hormonotherapy with an antidepressant, all within a hospital setting for a clinical trial. And they’ve explored the realms of combining printing with AI, fabricating flavored chewables for greater acceptance among pediatric patients, and creating spectroscopic QC methods for consistency and reliability.

This pioneering research has fostered strong clinical collaborations for the company, and it’s raising awareness that 3DP for pharmaceutical applications isn’t slowing down anytime soon. One major hurdle for the field is convincing pharmacists and healthcare providers that 3DP is a worthwhile method for creating these medications. FABRX’s open science and sharing of tangible clinical implementations serve as key markers of progress for the field, increasing confidence that 3DP will yield tangible benefits for patients and accelerating its adoption.

And where 3DP can really shine is in the creation of novel geometries unimaginable by traditional manufacturing methods. 3DP has the flexibility to fabricate drugs of widely varying porosities, multi-material shells for timed therapeutic release, and expandable/detachable structures for controlled retention. However, it’ll be hard for this next generation of geometrically complex, targeted drugs to be accepted if skeptics still perceive 3DP as too nascent for clinical translation. Companies such as FABRX are leading the much needed charge to communicate scientific discoveries and successes widely, showing that reliable, clinically-relevant 3DP is in the here and now.

Craft Health: Inspiration for the Point of Care Era

3D printing provides the ability to tune drug dosage levels for pediatric patients and provide a low-cost solution for smaller scale drug production, such as personalized medicines. However, none of this is worth it if pharmacists must invest time into fiddling with the technicalities of 3D printing, such as fine-tuning printing parameters.

Dr. Seng Han Lim, Technical Co-Founder & Chief Operating Officer at Craft Health, described how they’ve focused on making 3D printing as easy as possible for pharmacists with no prior experience in 3DP. The CraftMake printer is controlled by their software, which calculates recommended formulations, provides templates, and offers a streamlined way for pharmacists to press a few buttons and receive the intended result. The company offers CraftBlends, or standardized pre-mixed inks that don’t require heating or UV curing, eliminating guesswork around choosing the right material for the job.

The ease of adapting to a new workflow is really what can make or break a platform. Intuitive user interfaces, clear indications of when 3DP will be beneficial or not, and guardrails in place to detect when things will fail are essential for a smooth implementation. Nevertheless, troubleshooting printing issues won’t be easy for pharmacists in decentralized locations, hiring additional staff to maintain printers in smaller communities might be a challenge, and there will inevitably be drugs that pharmacists want to use with the printers that don’t yet have validation or QC measures in place.

It’s still encouraging to see that pharmaceutical 3DP companies such as Craft Health are investing heavily in creating robust platforms that anticipate potential pain points. And it’s an approach that many other areas of healthcare 3DP can take inspiration from. For example, many companies are becoming increasingly interested in using AI to automate processes in decentralized locations. Yet, we need guardrails for detecting when the system will fail and clear indications on how best clients can use AI to accelerate their current pipelines. Making the user experience as simple and foolproof as possible is key, and Craft Health is putting it at the top of their list.

CurifyLabs: Paths Forward in Regulation and Decentralization

Founded in 2021, CurifyLabs has already made incredible strides with their Pharma Printer 1, which can dose chewable tablets, capsules, suppositories, and liquids in seconds. Dr. Niklas Sandler, Founder and CTO at CurifyLabs, described how the company has made significant progress with introducing their printer in the US and Europe.

The company has recently collaborated with St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital to test the fabrication of custom hydrocortisone dosage forms to make it easier to administer the medication to pediatric patients. They’ve also worked with Tartu University Hospital in Estonia to print low-dose aspirin tablets that would have been otherwise hard to obtain for patients with aspirin hypersensitivity.

On top of successful use cases, there’s much to be optimistic about on the regulatory side. Dr. Sandler predicts that there won’t be as many regulatory barriers as it may seem, especially since they are printing dosage forms already described in pharmacopeias. He also points out that the pharmacopeias allow for tablets to be produced through extrusion, which includes 3D printing. So the message is to really push on: existing standards have set the stage for 3D printing to make its mark in pharmaceuticals, enabling disruptive change without large uncertainties from completely unpredictable novel products.

And because predictability is embedded in their system, Dr. Sandler described that the company can design formulations that a customer requests and add them to their software library for anyone to use as a template and recreate on their own printer. Companies such as CurifyLabs have a tremendous opportunity to create networks among seemingly disparate pharmacies across the world, enabling them to share new 3D printing settings to accelerate production. While the goal of 3D printing may be to decentralize, 3DP has a strong history of bringing people and expertise together, and innovators are in a position to facilitate the sharing of novel use cases through their platforms to benefit all.

NIST: Where Pharmaceutical 3D Printing and Metrology Meet

Dr. Thomas Forbes, a research scientist at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), has been studying pharmaceutical 3D printing using the Quality by Design (QbD) framework adopted by the FDA, which emphasizes that quality controls are put in place from the very beginning. The framework revolves around carefully considering the input materials used (critical material attributes; CMAs), the parameters that affect those materials (critical process parameters; CPPs), and the qualities desired in the outputs (critical quality attributes; CQAs).

In recent work, Dr. Forbes has shown how QbD can be implemented for point-of-care sites using pharmaceutical 3D printing with a drop-on-demand printer for various drugs such as levothyroxine and warfarin. Their measurements characterize the variability in volume and concentration dispensed, which can help guide the creation of effective quality control strategies for pharmaceutical settings. His other work on citalopram tablets quantifies the actual concentrations printed and the variability between tablets using the QbD framework.

There’s an incredible opportunity for a strong collaboration between NIST and 3DP innovators. To handle the extensive catalog of drugs that pharmacies may want to use in printers, effective QA/QC measures must be designed and implemented. Compiling drug validation data and formulating quality measures can be significantly accelerated through partnerships with government research entities that are actively looking to help create standards and datasets that will improve consistency in the field.

What We’re Thinking

The message from our speakers is loud and clear: putting printers in your neighborhood pharmacy is becoming a reality. That change will be brought about by open science, allowing all to build upon it, foolproof and straightforward workflows that make it easy for pharmacists to create networks in a decentralized system, and designing the next generation of quality controls for 3D-printed drugs. The road to widespread adoption will be bumpy, but the four innovators we hosted are taking a proactive approach to such challenges, anticipating and addressing variability and ease-of-use problems along the way to ensure the success of pharmaceutical 3DP. It’s this forward thinking of 3DP innovators that makes us hopeful for what’s to come. Stay tuned for the latest developments by subscribing to 3DHEALS and joining our live events.

About the Author:

Peter Hsu

Peter Hsu is an editorial intern for 3DHEALS.  He is currently an undergraduate at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and studies bioengineering with a focus on cell and tissue engineering.  He is also minoring in computer science with interests in artificial intelligence and image processing.  Peter conducts research on using computer vision methods to analyze human tissue images and improving the robustness of machine learning workflows.  He is interested in the use of AI to assist tissue engineering and bioprinting research for medical applications.  He is passionate about science communication and leads STEM outreach lessons at schools in the central Illinois area.

Related Links:

Event Recap: The 3D Bioprinting Frontier
3D Printing Organ on a Chip, Microfluidics Devices (On Demand, 2023)

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The post Event Recap: 3D Printed Pharmaceuticals appeared first on 3DHeals.

At our latest 3DHEALS event, we had the opportunity to catch up with four incredible leaders in the field to discuss the jaw-dropping technology they have been developing. While they employ different methods to print, the goal remains the same: to push the boundaries of the shapes and materials that can be printed. Join us as we recap the innovative printing designs they shared, including the use of light to redefine drug discovery through bioprinted vascular models, FRESH printing for an artificial pancreas ready for clinical trials, a tomography method that prints entire structures in seconds, and the state-of-the-art Puredyne bioprinter for hassle-free experimentation. You can also watch the event on-demand at 3DHEALS Courses now.

The future of drug testing starts with a voxel of light.

Personalization is at the core of 3D printing. We envision a future where personalized tissue models open new doors for rapidly screening therapies to find the right drug for a specific patient, all before they take a single pill. Innovators like Dr. Karolina Valente are bringing us one step closer to this paradigm shift in the way we test drugs.

Dr. Valente, CEO and CSO of VoxCell BioInnovation, states that we’ve already seen a shift in market and regulatory trends, particularly with the FDA Modernization Act 2.0 in 2022, which encourages the adoption of alternatives to animal testing, such as bioprinting, AI, and other technologies. This optimistic shift in regulatory perspective is driving her company’s work to create bioprinted vasculature models that can test the way that novel drugs flow through blood vessels and affect tissues, all in vitro.

Equipped with one of the highest resolution printers out there, the company uses two-photon polymerization to shine voxels of light on curable bioink, creating blood vessel structures down to less than 1 micron in diameter. They’ve shown that they can achieve greater than 80% cell viability and tissues lasting for 21 days, with research underway to extend it to a month.

The big challenge for the field now is capturing patient-specific biology in these models. Alongside the vascular networks, such models could one day mimic a patient’s specific cellular microenvironment, enabling more precise and targeted treatments for diseases such as cancer, where cellular cues and genetic mutations can differ from patient to patient. Until this level of specificity is reached, 3D printing still has much to do to embody the personalization that it promises.

Making this approach more personalized is on Dr. Valente’s mind. Still, until that day comes, she’s already making strides creating tissue models that incorporate the immune system, computational simulations that ensure blood flow within the networks is physiologically relevant, and universal bioinks that work for any printer type. It’ll take an entire ecosystem of products, computational software, and considerations to make the dream a reality, and the only way to start is to tackle it head-on.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2C1Rgm25Co

The path to human trials within 3 years: bioprinting for type 1 diabetes

It’s been years in the making. Now, clinical trials are only a step away for FluidForm Bio, a company that’s using 3D bioprinting to grow islet cells that produce insulin in the body as a cure for type 1 diabetes. Stemming from a landmark paper in 2015, the company’s use of freeform reversible embedding of suspended hydrogels, or FRESH, is paving the way for individuals to replace manual daily insulin injections with a more convenient artificial pancreas that is implanted right under the skin.

Mike Graffeo, CEO and Co-Founder of FluidForm Bio, describes how the company’s patented FRESH method, pioneered by Dr. Adam Feinberg’s lab at CMU, has been instrumental to their success. By directly injecting densely-packed cells and proteins into an aqueous solution without the use of extra artificial scaffolding material, they have been able to create islet cell constructs that encourage the growth of more extensive blood vessel networks than prints made using traditional methods. This abundant blood supply network is critical for islet cell survival, and, due to FRESH, can be grown naturally in the body without printing individual vessels.

The company has been developing methods to control the properties of the aqueous bath in which printing occurs, ensuring that the correct cellular cues are present for proper growth once the implant is placed in the body. For Graffeo, it’s essential that 3D printing encourages the development of dynamic cellular structures, rather than using printing with the intent of creating static vascular networks, which runs counter to how cells naturally grow and move.

FluidForm Bio exemplifies the success of striking the perfect balance between engineering and biology. As the hype around 3D bioprinting fades and realism comes into picture, innovators are thinking about how we can set the scene for biology to do the work for us rather than printing every intricate detail, such as tiny capillary vessels. Self-assembly of complex structures is a cornerstone of molecular biology, and 3D printing is the tool that will enable self-assembly to do the heavy lifting for us.

With successful studies showing that their FRESH implants restore normal blood sugar levels in diabetic mice, Graffeo predicts that their solution will be tested in human patients within the next 3 years and approved this decade. It’s certainly an ambitious goal, but it’s the passion and drive to do it that will see it through. Graffeo discussed FluidForm Bio’s beginnings on a recent 3DHEALS podcast, and it’s incredible to see how a meeting with now-CTO Dr. Adam Feinberg during their undergraduate years, combined with many years of continued dedication to realizing the potential of Dr. Feinberg’s work in saving patient lives, has culminated in a nearly trial-ready product.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JOHcYMsaVE] 

Don’t blink! Bioprinting in less than 30 seconds with Readily3D

The fabrication of cell-laden structures at scale and with high reproducibility is one of the grand challenges of bioprinting. With numerous printing and environmental parameters at play, the field must effectively address the fact that small changes can have significant impacts on cell behavior and growth. For Dr. Jorge Madrid-Wolff, Application Scientist at Readily3D, light-based bioprinting is key to achieving quick turnaround times on experiments and driving rapid innovation.

Readily3D’s tomographic 3D printer uses 405 nm light that rotates around a vat containing photosensitive ink, projecting light patterns that solidify the ink and produce a printed 3D structure without the need for extrusion or layer-by-layer printing. Their printers can cure a variety of photopolymers, such as hydrogels, acrylics, and silicones, to encapsulate a wide range of cell concentrations. The exciting part is that printing is completed in under 30 seconds for millimeter-scale constructs. 

The vast number of applications of their technology is truly astounding. Researchers at ETH Zürich have used Readily3D’s printers to create in vitro models of mammary ducts that successfully produce milk proteins, Joshua tree-inspired lattice houses for photosynthetic bacteria to perform carbon sequestration, and microfilament networks that guide cells to grow and align with one another.

Aside from the vast array of applications possible with such speeds, seconds-scale 3D bioprinting paves the way for studies involving a larger number of samples, enabling innovators to move beyond small sample sizes and gain a better understanding of the variability present in their experiments. The need for faster, on-demand printing has garnered significant attention, with several ARPA-H grants focusing on speed and scalability. Printers such as Readily3D’s will enable the testing of vast numbers of prints with different combinations of physical and morphological characteristics that can be used to create large datasets for training AI models to find optimal printing parameters.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obC1I8TLbWM] 

Bringing printing to the masses

3D bioprinting has advanced significantly due to the spirit of designing and fabricating objects of our imagination, much like the adrenaline rush of hobby printing. For Annaliese Vojnich, Business Development and Technical Sales Manager at ViscoTec America, the company has found its strengths in empowering researchers and innovators with their Puredyne bioprinter, enabling individuals of a wide range of backgrounds to create the bioprints they desire. The printer is capable of printing with a wide variety of materials, has a simple plug-and-play design for inserting bioinks with cartridge-like printheads, and solves many issues experienced by printers such as inconsistent extrusion and temperature control.

What we hope to see in the next few years is the emergence of scalable, state-of-the-art bioprinters that all can utilize. The field can go far simply by leveraging the spirit that created it in the first place: collaboration, ideation, and the drive to make the impossible. And these platforms, as well as the ones we’ve seen from our other speakers, are enabling this creative spirit for the masses. It’s the sharing of technology and information that will bring new methods in bioprinting to fruition, and companies that create modular, easy-to-use platforms are bringing the future of this field to everyone’s doorstep.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kegyl8B38G0] 

What we’re thinking

Bioprinting has undoubtedly reached new heights in the last few years. Still, several exciting challenges remain, especially in the need to create personalized tissue models, determine the right cellular cues to induce tissue and blood vessel self-assembly, and develop platforms that anyone can use to print at scale and incredible speeds. The energy of early-stage startups like VoxCell BioInnovation and the clinical trials that are within reach for FluidForm Bio is keeping the adrenaline levels of the field high. The versatility and ease of use of Readily3D and Puredyne printers are ushering in a new era, making 3D bioprinting a more accessible and feasible option for researchers and engineers worldwide. We’re excited to see what’s next, and we hope you are, too. Stay up-to-date with what’s to come by subscribing to the 3DHEALS newsletter and joining our events live.

Related Links:

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The post Event Recap: The 3D Bioprinting Frontier appeared first on 3DHeals.

AI is taking center stage in the tech world. Large-language models and AI agents are now gaining traction as productivity-boosters on mainstream platforms such as Google Search and Siri. And the 3D printing industry is closely following suit. The practicality of using AI for medical 3D printing rests on developing trustworthy algorithms that prioritize patient safety while advancing innovation, a harrowing feat considering the black-box nature of many AI algorithms and need for diverse, large-scale datasets. But for the four innovators we heard from at our latest 3DHEALS event, it’s a challenge worth tackling. In this event recap, we take a look at how these changemakers are creating AI tools that collaborate with doctors to predict outcomes before surgery, recommend optimal bioink formulations for digital dentistry and gum disease, create a ChatGPT for operating and servicing 3D printers, and image segmentation for a personalized pessary device. Watch the recording on 3DHEALS Courses.

Cosmetic surgery: using AI to predict the future

Big tech companies are looking at AI agents, or programs that perform actions on the user’s behalf, to expand the role AI plays in our everyday decision-making. For 3D printing innovators, they’re envisioning AI as a key player in augmenting clinical decisions.

William Jung, Business Development Director at FITme, describes how the company is developing “THE FACE ON,” an AI engine capable of segmenting anatomical structures in CT scans and predicting patient outcomes after surgery. Anatomical segmentation is becoming a popular application of AI in the field (just see what Materialise and others are doing). And it’s the patient outcome prediction that’s pushing the boundaries of what AI can do, making it more of an oracle and not just a replacement for manual tasks.

The project is still in the works, but such software could provide patients with side-by-side before and after pictures of their face during the planning process for cosmetic facial surgery. The AI can then recommend the best shapes and sizes for the company’s custom 3D-printed molds that are then used to create silicone implants for the surgery. The goal of this AI assistant is to reduce uncertainties patients may have about their procedure, building trust that the surgery will yield the results they desire.

What’s key in the company’s strategy is that they’re not simply an implant company. Rather, they’re an implant company driven by data. If 3D printing innovators want to truly leverage AI, they’ve first got to invest in collecting and storing as much data as they can get. Techniques that FITme uses, such as Cascade nnU-Net3D (a type of AI model), require large-scale image datasets to prove effective.

Abundant and diverse data are everything, especially because AI products can fail for many reasons: the training data were poor quality, the AI was trained on one patient population but fails when used on a different population, the AI is used at another hospital that uses a different brand of imaging equipment than they were expecting, and more.

AI predicts bioink formulations for bioprinted gum

Getting it just right is no easy feat in 3D printing, especially considering the myriad of printing parameters and bioink formulation combinations that one must experiment with to create the optimal product. But for our speakers, AI is the way out of this conundrum.

Dr. Gopu Sriram, Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Dentistry, National University of Singapore, is harnessing AI to predict which experiments to run next. Developed by colleague Dr. Dean Ho, Professor of Biomedical Engineering at NUS, the “IDentif.AI” platform was designed to help researchers pick which combinations of different drugs would produce the most promising new therapies for various infectious diseases, such as COVID-19. And Dr. Sriram has adapted the technology for bioprinting.

Dr. Sriram and colleagues were able to use the AI platform to predict the output filament diameter of their bioprinter based on the complex combination of pressure, printing speed, and nozzle diameter used. Without AI, they would need to have performed more than a thousand prints just to test four bioink formulations, which would be a costly and time-consuming ordeal. 

“Contracting the timeline” is a key accelerator in biopharma research and drug developement.

Published in Advanced Healthcare Materials, they applied the software to bioprinting gum tissue grafts to treat gum recession by first starting with a training set of 25 prints using different printing settings and bioinks. The Identif.AI platform then provided the researchers with recommended printing settings to achieve the filament diameter they desired. Predicting the resulting characteristics of their bioprinted gum tissues is especially important since the size and shape of such grafts can significantly impact treatment outcomes.

AI is opening doors for accelerating the rate of research, acting as a compass for which direction to head in next. However, the critical challenges ahead will be validating these AI systems (which will inevitably take much time and expense), transferring the technology to all the various niche applications of bioprinting, and expanding its ability to “understand” more than just a few types of drugs or bioinks.

Despite these challenges, Dr. Sriram’s work shows that AI’s utility in such a specific area of bioprinting (i.e., gum tissue grafts) is not just promising, it’s already a reality. Possessing a high cell viability and desired shape, their gum grafts are bringing personalized bioprinted tissues into focus.

Digital gynecology: AI to create a personalized pessary device

Building robust AI models depends on quality measurements. For Cosm Medical, that means redesigning the way that pelvic anatomy is imaged and measured.

Aye Nyein San, Head of Technology and Operations at Cosm, describes how the company is creating personalized pessaries made from 3D-printed molds to support the pelvic organs for individuals with prolapse. Their rapid AI segmentation models enable them to automatically identify key pelvic structures from ultrasound images, create patient-specific measurements, and design custom pessaries that improve symptoms and increase patient satisfaction.

The company is researching better methods of analyzing pelvic anatomy, such as their work on developing “colpodynamic imaging,” which uses a water-filled bag to distend the vagina for measuring mechanical properties. These measurements can provide improved diagnostic insights by creating a more objective, quantifiable model of patient anatomy while also improving the accuracy of soft tissue segmentation by AI models due to the higher contrast that the water bag provides in ultrasound imaging.

AI infrastructure is so much more than software. Without accurate and cost-effective instrumentation to objectively collect patient measurements, the AI is useless. Additionally, while cloud-based AI solutions may eliminate the need for on-site computing hardware, if the AI software is slow and laggy, confidence in the tool will deteriorate. For Cosm Medical, tackling the AI challenge means closely examining every step of the process that AI will affect and be affected by.

A ChatGPT for 3D printing

The future of large-language models (LLMs) is personalization: getting tailor-made responses from ChatGPT that answer in your domain-specific language and with a high level of technical knowledge. And innovators are asking: how can we make a ChatGPT for 3D printing that people will actually use?

Dr. Gregory Hayes, Senior Vice President of Global Additive Minds at EOS, notes how EOS is leveraging many years of printer data, user manuals, service reports, and other company records to create robust datasets to train AI to enhance their products. Their ChatGPT-like LLM acts as a knowledge management tool, enabling users to quickly receive advice on how to service an EOS printer without having to manually look through lengthy documents.

The additive manufacturing company, which serves a variety of industries outside of healthcare, is also feeding the data from the sensors of their printers into an AI algorithm to recognize when prints have gone wrong and make corrective decisions on the fly.

Dr. Hayes points out that AI is enabling the large-scale integration of many forms of data: images taken during prints, material properties, sensor data, machine logs, and more. However, AI is still in its infancy, and it’s important to recognize all the factors that AI has yet to take into account. Cell viability? Implant rejection? Likelihood of infection?

As Dr. Hayes noted, the hope behind AI is that it will make printing easier: you no longer need to have many years of experience in printing one particular thing to get the results you want. Troubleshooting, anomaly detection, and error correction can be done automatically or with relative ease using an AI assistant.

What we’re thinking

The critical need is for human innovators to guide the way that AI integrates all these different forms of data together. We might not be able to throw everything in one pot, train an LLM on it, and hope it works out. Instead, it will be important for 3D printing experts to pay attention to developments in making AI “think” in a more methodical manner, using complex reasoning skills and having the AI model explain where and how it got to its conclusions.

While there are still many challenges to get to the point where AI in 3D printing truly makes life easier for all, AI developments have and will continue to depend on the one thing that can be counted on: human creativity. And with the many applications of AI we’ve seen from our speakers, the future of 3D printing is bright. Subscribe to 3DHEALS to join us live for our future online and in-person events.

About the Author: 

Peter Hsu is an editorial intern for 3DHEALS.  He is currently an undergraduate at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and studies bioengineering with a focus on cell and tissue engineering.  He is also minoring in computer science with interests in artificial intelligence and image processing.  Peter conducts research on using computer vision methods to analyze human tissue images and improving the robustness of machine learning workflows.  He is interested in the use of AI to assist tissue engineering and bioprinting research for medical applications.  He is passionate about science communication and leads STEM outreach lessons at schools in the central Illinois area.

Related Links:

Expert Corner: AI in Healthcare 3D Printing: The Future is Now

Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing (On Demand, 2025)

3D Printing Organ on a Chip, Microfluidics Devices (On Demand, 2023)

3D Printing and Microfluidics (On Demand, 2022)
Microfluidics, Technology, Commercialization (On Demand, 2021)

Event Recap: 3D Microfabrication
Event Recap: 3D Bioprinting Biofabricating Skin Components
Revolutionizing 3D-Printed Facial Titanium Implants Polishing

Event Recap: 3D-Printed Devices In Orthopedics

Event Recap: Microfluidic Devices and 3D Printing

The post Event Recap: Artificial Intelligence Updates For 3D Printing and Bioprinting appeared first on 3DHeals.