Mohit P. Chhaya, PhD, is a biomedical engineer with a career marked by pioneering contributions to biofabrication and tissue engineering. A Queensland University of Technology alum, Dr. Chhaya has authored numerous Q1 top-tier journal publications and developed cutting-edge technologies licensed by leading 3D BioPrinter manufacturers. As the co-founder and CEO of BellaSeno, he successfully raised EUR 17 million, steering the company towards ISO 13485 certification and steering its flagship product, Senella, through clinical translation. His tenure at BellaSeno also involved transforming it into a multi-product company and achieving market authorization for innovative, best-in-class regenerative scaffolds.
Before founding BellaSeno, Dr. Chhaya co-founded Biofabrication Design Solutions, focusing on additive manufacturing for multi-material constructs. His professional journey includes roles in regulatory affairs, postdoctoral research, and financial analysis, demonstrating a broad skill set beyond bioengineering. Dr. Chhaya’s innovations have garnered international recognition, earning him prestigious awards such as the MIT Top 20 Innovators Under 35 and the German Innovation Award 2021. An active ASTM Committee on Additive Manufacturing member and a respected speaker at international conferences, Dr. Chhaya is deeply involved in advancing biofabrication standards and education. His remarkable IP portfolio includes numerous patents and designs across various jurisdictions, underscoring his contribution to medical technology innovation. Dr. Chhaya will be speaking at the upcoming 3D printing for breast implants event. Also, check out the link below for a recent podcast I did with Dr. Chhaya.

When was the first encounter you had with 3D printing? What was that experience like? What were you thinking at that moment?

My first encounter with 3D printing occurred during my Honours year in biomedical engineering. I was working on a project involving preparing histological sections of scaffolds implanted in sheep to regenerate bone tissue. Within the same lab, a team was assembling a custom-built bioprinter. Witnessing the creation of complex structures with such precision felt like stepping into the future. At that moment, I realized the potential for 3D printing to revolutionize medical treatments.

Noticing that most G-code for fabricating the scaffolds was written by hand, which was highly inefficient, I leveraged my programming skills from previous freelance work for bioinformaticians. I offered to design custom slicer scripts specifically for fabricating scaffolds for tissue engineering. Professor Dietmar Hutmacher, who led the project, accepted my offer and introduced me to his postdoc. This experience was the catalyst for my journey into 3D printing.

What inspired you to start your journey?

The inspiration to start BellaSeno was deeply personal. Like many, I have a family history of breast cancer; my grandmother was diagnosed in the 90s and underwent a lumpectomy, but reconstruction options were limited. The prospect of full biological regeneration through 3D printing was no longer science fiction, and I was compelled to pursue this technology to create better solutions for patients like my grandmother.

Who inspired you the most along this journey in 3D printing?

Several individuals have been instrumental in my journey. My grandmother, whose experience with breast cancer sparked my passion; my PhD supervisors, who guided my academic and professional growth; and the investors in BellaSeno, whose belief in our vision has been unwavering. Most importantly, the patients whose lives have been transformed by our products continue to inspire and motivate me daily.

What motivates you the most for your work?

The most significant motivation for my work is the tangible positive impact on patients’ lives. At BellaSeno, we focus on treating patients who have experienced complications with silicone implants and seek a better alternative. These patients often have limited options and fall through the cracks in the medical system. Seeing their physical and emotional well-being improve after receiving our scaffolds is incredibly motivating.

What is/are the biggest obstacle(s) in your line of work? If you have conquered them, what were your solutions?

One of the biggest obstacles has been the regulatory challenges in getting new medical devices approved. Navigating these regulations requires a deep understanding of both the technology and the legal landscape.

We realized that the breast implant industry, including regulators like the FDA, needed to be educated on new technologies like scaffolds. The FDA offers defined interaction pathways, which we utilized to gain clarity. In the EU, we leveraged the Custom-Made device pathway to market our scaffolds for lower-risk applications. Demonstrating the safety and efficacy of our technology in real-world scenarios has paved the way for broader approval in breast surgeries.

What do you think is (are) the biggest challenge(s) in 3D Printing/bio-printing? What do you think the potential solution(s) is (are)?

The biggest challenge in 3D printing and bio-printing is scalability. While creating prototypes and small batches is feasible, scaling up production for widespread use at a reasonable cost is complex.

To address this, we initiated a 3D printing innovation program, drawing inspiration from traditional plastic processing industries. We developed a comprehensive in-house software and hardware stack, including scaffold design, slicing, 3D printers, and post-processing equipment. This infrastructure allows us to scale production to over one million units annually, with costs comparable to silicone implant manufacturing.

Beyond this challenge, the 3D printing industry needs to evolve from being just a cool piece of technology to a routinely used manufacturing method. Innovation must come from the product side beyond simple customization. This means developing innovative designs and performance features that can only be realized with 3D printing, thus unlocking the full potential of the technology.

If you are granted three wishes by a higher being, what would they be?

1. Universal access to food.
2. Aging gracefully.
3. Discontent – not quite satisfied with what I have but driven to do better.

What advice would you give to a smart driven college student in the “real world”? What bad advice should they ignore?

My advice is to be tenacious. The real world is full of challenges without ready-made solutions, but dedication and continuous learning will help you overcome them.

Ignore the bad advice that a great idea originating in a university lab is 90% of the work toward a successful startup. Execution and perseverance are keys to turning an idea into a thriving business.

What’s your favorite book you read this year and why? Alternatively, what’s your favorite book of all times you read and why?

My favorite book this year is “Alexander the Great and the Logistics of the Macedonian Army” by DW Engels. While many historical books focus on Alexander’s biography and strategies, this one highlights the critical role of logistics in his strategic victories. It offers interesting parallels with the business world, where strategy is often emphasized, but the nuts and bolts of execution are equally important.

Relevant Links:

Interview with Esther Valliant: Bioglass for 3D Printing

Interview with Dr. Bryan Scheer: From Bedside To SiNAPTIC Technologies

Past 3DHEALS Influencer Interviews

3DHEALS Lattice Podcast

Interested in sponsoring our podcast? Contact: info@3dheals.com

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Piyush Padmanabhan journey into the world of Bioprinting began with his experience in the organ transplantation sector. Post his under graduation from Vellore Institute of Technology, Piyush began his career in the pharmaceutical sector at Biocon Limited and then at Roche Pharmaceuticals, where he worked closely with physicians and transplant coordinators in Kidney and Liver Transplants. The ever-widening gap in organs available for transplant and the need for these organs was very apparent to him. This led him to begin Next Big Innovation Labs® with Alok and Pooja, the other two co-founders of the company. In his role as the CEO and Co-Founder of Next Big Innovation Labs®, Piyush has led various deep technology projects in bioprinting and has also played a pivotal role in raising central and state government funding for the company. Some of the projects he has led are the following: the development of India’s first customised 3D Bioprinter, the development of unique temperature control fixtures for diverse bioprinting components and AI/ML integration into Trivima Bioprinting Systems. Piyush currently holds two technology patents and one process patent in the domain of bioprinting and considers himself to be an eternal student. His goal is to one day bridge the gap in the organ transplantation sector and believes in deep collaborations to achieve this goal. Piyush will be joining us at the upcoming virtual event Healthcare 3D Printing Ecosystem: India.

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Jenny: When was the first encounter you had with 3D printing?

Piyush: My first experience with 3D Printing was when I had once gone in for a casual visit to Alok’s (one of the other co-founders of NBIL) house. He had a single extrusion FDM 3D Printer which had these insane blue lights. This was way back in 2015 when not many people were aware of the technology. My first reaction was an amalgamation of curiosity and astonishment. You always get to see multiple videos of subtractive manufacturing but for the first time in my life, I was seeing something getting built from the ground up. The only thought in my mind was about the mechanism behind the process. I wanted to know everything about the technology and wanted to explore more about its applications of the technology. Immediately after this experience, I went on to read as many articles and watch as many videos on youtube as I could on 3D Printing.

Jenny: What inspired you to start your journey?

Piyush: During my stint in pharmaceuticals, Biocon Limited, and Roche Pharmaceuticals, I got to interact with clinicians and transplant coordinators in depth about the challenges involved in organ transplantation and patient quality of life. These discussions were mainly revolving around renal and liver transplants, as these were the two primary focus areas for me in both organizations. These discussions would be really intensive and we would do deep dives into the various intricacies involved in patient treatment modalities, quality of life, alternative treatment strategies, and the global demand for organ availability for transplants. During my deep dive reading and watching sessions, post my visit to Alok’s home, I came across bioprinting and got to watch the TED Video by Dr. Antony Atala. There is no singular factor that led me to begin my journey. It was a convergence of multiple factors that led me on this journey.

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Jenny: Who inspired you the most along this journey in Bioprinting?

Piyush: Dr. Antony Atala and Dr. Jayesh Bellare

Jenny: What motivates you the most for your work? 

Piyush: The fact that we’re working towards something bigger than ourselves. The deep collaborations we have established not only enable us but also provide us with the purpose to truly change the way clinical medicine is done on a global scale. 

Jenny: What is/are the biggest obstacle(s) in your line of work? If you have conquered them, what were your solutions? 

Piyush: When you’re starting up, you aim for the stars but realize you need to reach the moon first. Our aim as a company was to utilize bioprinters for clinical applications. In order to achieve this, we would have to have complete control over the engineering – right from the precision in the movement to the optimization of temperature control to the complex engineering solutions that would be required for precision bioprinting. The placement of each cell per square millimeter of the scaffold would matter with regard to the overall fidelity of the tissue construct.

Creating complex geometries would require absolute control over extruder and bed movements. Building the engineering from the ground up was the only solution here and this was one of the biggest hurdles for us to overcome. The first obstacle was the funding, which we closed within the first 12 months of the inception of Next Big Innovation Labs®. We received grant funding from the Karnataka State Government to build customized bioprinters. The second was actually building the technology. This was quite a challenge as we had to explore various concepts in pneumatic and droplet technologies. It did take quite a bit of reading, a bit of experimentation, and a lot of failures, but we did get there. The third was accuracy in movement and temperature control. This was where we developed two key technologies and filed patents for them.

Jenny: What do you think is (are) the biggest challenge(s) in 3D Printing/bio-printing? What do you think the potential solution(s) is (are)?

Piyush: One of the biggest challenges in Bioprinting – Bioprinting Micro-capillaries 

Potential Solution – An amalgamation of various tissue engineering technologies (freeze-drying, electrospinning, electrowriting, bioprinting, etc), novel biomaterial development that closely mimics the body’s natural micro-environment, and interdisciplinary learning.

Jenny: If you are granted three wishes by a higher being, what would they be? 

Piyush: I just have one though: Make orbital flights affordable for the common man (In order for us humans to understand that the world is one and in some instances, actually round).

Jenny: What advice would you give to a smart driven college student in the “real world”? What bad advice you heard should they ignore? 

Piyush: Never Let Others Define Who You Are and What You Can Achieve. You can always figure a way out of any difficult situation and don’t shy away from collaborating or asking for help.
Some of the bad advice you should ignore: This will not work | This is science fiction and you should work on something that will work in the short term.

Related Links:

Medical 3D Printing – An Indian Perspective on Point of Care Micro Labs

Interview with Firoza Kothari, co-founder Anatomiz3D (Video)

3DHEALS Instagram Live: Medical 3D Printing with Co-Founder of Anatomiz3D Firoza Kothari

3DHEALS Startup Showcase: Singapore (On Demand, Oct 28th, 2021)

3DHEALS Ohio: Hidden Gems (On Demand, March 18th, 2021)

3DHeals Melbourne – 3D MedTech Innovation (On Demand, 2021)

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In this episode, I had the pleasure to chat with professor Stephanie Willerth at the University of Victoria, also the founder and CEO of Axolotl Biosciences about bioprinting and bioink. Stephanie is not only an expert in bioprinting and bioinks in general, but also one of a few scientists in the world focusing on using 3D cell models on common but devastating neurological diseases such as GBM, Parkinson’s Disease, and Alzheimer’s Disease. We started with some basic concepts related to bioprinting, bioinks, organoids, and organ-on-a-chip, and some of the general current applications and ongoing researches. All of these technologies, however, require sophisticated bioink formulation to achieve structural and functional goals. Also, who are the major players in commercial bioprinting? 

Good news, prof. Willerth will be sharing her experiences at our virtual event 3D Bioprinting and Organoids.

Other versions of this episode and important links: 

Instagram

Axolotl Biosciences

Willerth Lab

Youtube

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About our guest for this episode:

Dr. Willerth holds a Canada Research Chair in Biomedical Engineering at the University of Victoria where she has dual appointments in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and the Division of Medical Sciences as an Associate Professor.

She serves as the Acting Director for the Centre for Biomedical Research at the University of Victoria and on the steering committee of the B.C. Regenerative Medicine Initiative. She also served as the President of the Canadian Biomaterials Society from 2017-2018. Her honors include being named the 2018 REACH award winner for Excellence in Undergraduate Research-inspired Teaching, a Woman of Innovation in 2017, one of the 2015 Young Innovators in Cellular and Biological Engineering, and a “Star in Global Health” by Grand Challenges Canada in 2014. She spent the Fall of 2016 on sabbatical at the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery supported by the International Collaboration on Repair Discoveries International Travel Award where she wrote her book “Engineering neural tissue using stem cells” published by Academic Press.

She completed her postdoctoral work at the University of California-Berkeley after receiving her Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering from Washington University. Her undergraduate degrees were in Biology and Chemical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

When was the first encounter you had with 3D printing? What was that experience like? What were you thinking at that moment?

Stephanie: I had been interested in 3D printing for years as the University of Victoria is home to the non-profit – Victoria Hand Project. It was in 2016 and meeting with Erik Gateholm from Cellink that I began to see the potential of this technology for tissue engineering. 

What inspired you to start your journey/company/career/research in 3D printing (bio-fabrication/bio-printing)?

Stephanie: I was always interested in science and engineering. With regards to bioprinting, our lab was excited to explore this technology as a way to standardize and increase the throughput of the tissue engineering process.  

Who inspired you the most along this journey in 3D printing (bio-printing/bio-fabrication)? This can be a mentor, a patient, a celebrity, anyone basically. You can name more than one as well.

Stephanie: Joe DeSimone – founder of Carbon and fellow professor – is inspiring as he shows how to balance running an academic group while translating 3D printing technologies for commercial applications.  

What motivates you the most for your work? 

Stephanie: I have always been fascinated by the nervous system and our work is motivated by trying to find better treatments and cures for neurodegenerative diseases. 

What is/are the biggest obstacle(s) in your line of work? If you have conquered them, what were your solutions? 

Stephanie: Scale-up of cell production is a major challenge when bioprinting physiologically relevant human tissue models. Characterization of the tissues and their properties can also be challenging. 

What do you think is (are) the biggest challenge(s) in 3D Printing/bio-printing? What do you think the potential solution(s) is (are)?

Stephanie: See above – better bioreactor technology will play a role as will driving down the costs of cell culture media and reagents. 

If you are granted three wishes by a higher being, what would they be? 

Stephanie: Accessible healthcare for everyone, sufficient research funding to pursue all our ideas, and more time to do science. 

What advice would you give to a smart driven college student in the “real world”? What bad advices you heard should they ignore? 

Stephanie: I would suggest working in both academic research labs as well as in industry to see what each experience is like. Also, it is never to early to start networking. 

What’s your favorite book you read this year and why? Alternatively, what’s your favorite book of all times you read and why?

Stephanie: For business purposes, Walter Issacson’s biography of Elon Musk was an interesting read. For fiction, Navola by Paolo Bacigalupi was intriguing though I did not realize that it is the first of a series. 

Related Links:

3D Bioprinting Glioblastoma Models for Drug Screening

3D Bioprinting Personalized Brain Tissues

3DHEALS IG Live Recordings: 3D Printing in Veterinary Medicine with Richard Doerer

3D Bioprinting Substrate Stiffness – Often Overlooked, But Always at Work

Synthetic and Natural Bioinks

From Academia: Tweaking Bioinks Palette, One-Drop 3D Printing

From Academia: Nanoclay Bioink, Machine Learning, Hydrogel Design Strategies for 3D Bioprinting

3D Bioprinting: The Yellow Brick Road of (Part 1)

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In this fun and insightful conversation with the co-founder and co-owner of Cabiomede (Instagram: @CabiomedeVet), I learned a lot more about Mateusz Pawlik, who is behind many of the incredible veterinary 3D printing products for both surgical plannings and for educational purposes. As a young entrepreneur, Mateusz shared with us his earlier failures right out of school, later, business pivots, and future outlook on healthcare 3D printing, not just for veterinary medicine but also for human medicine. We discussed many challenges facing the industry, in particular, how to encourage healthcare providers to adopt a new way of practice and thinking.  Mateusz will also be speaking at the upcoming 3D Printing for Animals webinar.

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Fun excerpts from the interview: 

Jenny: It’s quite interesting that you guys came out of school just decided on funding and companies instead of looking for a job. I mean, there’s a huge amount of risk here, because may not even be able to put food on the table. Because, you know, it’s not like you have worked for 10 years and saved up and how did you make that decision and decide that risk was worth it?

Mateusz: Actually, if I would have a second chance, would I do the same?  I’m not so sure if I would go this way. 

Because we did not have much experience in the market, we didn’t have any savings of 10 years working in a corporation or something like that. So we were young, and stupid, probably. But it was like, oh, let’s just make the company. Everyone will buy from us, everyone will want our products. And we will manage it somehow. The reality was not so colorful, I might say because, as I said, we have started in four co-founders. And after two years, we had a little breakage in the company. So two co-founders have left us. But those two better ones are still developing Carbiomed.

 So from that time, I think it was quite important to break up with the other two co-founders and go in our own direction. And from that time, we have developed our production company in quite a good direction. Now we are a six-people company with a lot of work to do. We are the 10 people, including the contractors. 

 And some time ago, I’ve been listening to a Guy Kawasaki webinar when he was talking about 10 biggest mistakes made by startups. So we made all of them. So he was telling me about projections of financing, scaling, multiplying numbers, etc, etc., we make every single mistake, but we are still alive, and we are still in the market. We are developing. I think those mistakes were needed to make us stronger.

Jenny: Show us a few fun examples!

Mateusz (see video): I would like to start with probably the most interesting part because people are thinking veterinary medicine is a lower level of medicine…But it’s completely opposite. Simply simple case. This is a copy of an eight-week-old cat who has a broken pelvic bone and digestive problems. The smallest one, the weight of such a patient is less than one kilogram. So our smallest patients are smaller than newborns. The typical newborn is like 3.5 kilos, so it’s a Yorkshire Terrier. Our patients are like newborns. The biggest patient was more than 80 kilos, for example. So we have from time to time difference of 100 times in weight. The smallest one is one kilogram, the biggest one is 100 kilos. 

Veterinary medicine is pretty demanding. It’s, it’s not easy. Every single time you have a different dog species… We have a different organism to treat with different needs. It’s not like human medicine where a typical person is 75 kilos. Every single time our patient is from one through to 100 (kilos).

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About our guest this week:

Mateusz Pawlik, co-owner of Cabiomede

Graduate of Biomedical Engineering at the Silesian University of Technology in Poland. He gained his experience working in international companies in the medical industry as a product engineer and continuous development manager. Co-owner of CABIOMEDE – company providing R&D services in medical engineering area and Pets Analytics – startup developing an innovative solution in the field of animal health monitoring.

Operations Manager responsible for new products and technology development – presurgical models, custom made surgical guides and implants, polymeric and metal spine and joint implants for animals. Together with CABIOMEDE team developed more than 500 patient’s cases on a basis of Computed Tomography. His biggest project was related to create veterinary surgical workshop models – full canine and feline fractures database according to AOVet classification.

Related Articles: 

Prof. Ali Khademhosseini: Academic Entrepreneur

Robert Pugliese: Design for Healthcare with 3DPrinting

No More Manual Work: Interview with Xkelet CEO and Co-founder Jordi Tura (Video)

Bioart With Amy Karle: How 3D Printing Connects Art, Science, Humanity

The Perfect Biopolymer: An Interview with Akira Science on Biodegradable 3D Printable Materials

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In this episode of Instagram Live, we were fortunate to interview the CEO of Brinter , Tomi Kalpio, on Instagram Live to learn the birth history of Brinter, what makes Brinter differentiated from other bioprinting platforms, biotechnology entrepreneur life in Finland, Tomi’s vision for bioprinting and regenerative medicine field, and the future of Brinter, why “collaboration” is more meaningful in 3D bioprinting either in the academia or commercial/pharma world, why is no one creating software for bioprinting? 

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Fun Excerpts for this podcast: 

Why your bioprinting company is named “Brinter”?

 “The name Brinter came from and then I realized that we have a long history in 3d printing in general, and also biomaterials. So I think it was obvious that we came up with the idea to combine those both to become a printer. So that’s the very short version of how everything happened.”

What was Brinter’s founding story? 

“So the story began when I was born in 1978, 3d blood in my veins. So since I was a little kid, I would have been always building something in 3D. And in 1999, I first time saw 3d printing and in 2006, I already use it in end products. At that time, it was the SLS method. And in 2011,  we started to think about how to utilize this business-wise, with a couple of colleagues who later became cofounders for 3D Tech.

We analyze the markets and power port our own scanners and printers and, and 3d design software’s. In 2013, we decided to finally start up the company called  3D Tech, and  3D Tech works at with two different business units since the beginning.   3D Tech provides services, designing, creating, scanning while developing technologies, and our first own printer was DLP based that we developed in 2015. 

And in 2016, we found our passion and the path of the technology business unit. 

We were asked to participate brain 3D printing project that was more than interesting at that time. And we said yes immediately because I felt it in my heart that this is the way that we need to go. The next year after that, in 2017, we participated in a 3D printing kidney project with the same feeling…And during that time, we also started to develop our own first bioprinter. 

And at that time, we also got the idea about the modular system with this tool sensing interface that brings the printer differentiate from others. And we have been using that in our own research and development process as well. So after a couple of years, in 2020, we separated the companies, and now Brinter is own separate entity and has nothing to do with the 3D Tech anymore. So that’s the very long story short how it all happened.”

Also relevant to this podcast: 

About our Guest for this Episode: 

Tomi Kalpio, CEO of Brinter

An innovative leader always looking for new ways to tackle old challenges by creating solutions you did not know that you need.

Leadership and Management skills:

– Technological Competence Management; Technologically-oriented business knowledge which creates a solid ground to analyze and develop global operations and processes

– Order-to-Delivery process

Technical skills:

– Bioprinting / Additive Manufacturing / 3D-printing / 3D Design Professional

– Value-adding to production processes and product

– Know how from small product specific details to large production lines

Related Articles: 

Prof. Ali Khademhosseini: Academic Entrepreneur

Robert Pugliese: Design for Healthcare with 3DPrinting

No More Manual Work: Interview with Xkelet CEO and Co-founder Jordi Tura (Video)

Bioart With Amy Karle: How 3D Printing Connects Art, Science, Humanity

The Perfect Biopolymer: An Interview with Akira Science on Biodegradable 3D Printable Materials

The post IG Live: Tomi Kalpio: CEO of Brinter appeared first on 3DHeals.

Matteo Zanfabro, Doctor of Veterinary Medicine, is applying 3D printing to Veterinary  Medicine since 2015 during his experimental thesis “The use of 3D printing in preoperative surgical planning”. After graduation in 2017, he founded a private research project named “3D Veterinary Printing” which focused on veterinary clinical research and application of 3D printing technology, winning the “MSD Community Award” in 2018.  After a period as a Research Fellow at the University of Parma, now he is full-employed in PlayCast (www.playcast.it) as a member of R&D and in charge of the new company branch: PlayVet (www.playvet.it). It is a system for Veterinary Hospital and Clinics to provide 3D printed made-to-measure veterinary medical devices for small animal patients, from orthosis to perioperative supports. PlayVet is going to be available from  September 2021 in few authorized centers in northern Italy. Matteo will be speaking at our upcoming event focusing on animals for 3D printing.

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Jenny: When was the first encounter you had with 3D printing?

Matteo: I first met 3d printing in an online magazine. I remember the online paper I read: it was about a surgeon who decided to 3D print a copy of a patient heart before performing its surgery; the paper reported how this technique provided the surgeon with a very important advantage in performing the surgery reducing time ad risk for the patient.  This advantage, related to a more precise e practical knowledge of the surgical field, was directly linked to the ability of reading and managing CT images and I was already deeply in love with radiology even before, so 3D printing entered quite smoothly in my life, as a student and also later as a professional.

Jenny: What inspired you to start your journey?

Matteo: Different things pushed me to pursue this journey. First, the possibility to work on a CT scan and export any kind of 3D data in order to produce what I wanted. 3d printing is a powerful instrument in a profession where the market is not able to offer what you need and desire as a professional and where patients differ so deeply in terms of anatomy and medical/surgical needs (instruments, surgical guides, 3D model for anatomy and surgery, etc..). Second, the possibility to write my thesis on this subject: I had to approach human medicine literature (except few case reports, there was no veterinary medicine literature available) and its 3D printed applications but  I had also to explore other fields (architecture, prototyping, concrete industry, bio-tech, etc.). I studied how  3D printing affected the fields where it was already applied and the innovation it had brought. I wanted to be part of this innovation in my professional field. 

I also found out I really like the research process and the satisfaction of doing and performing something new, walking through unconventional or unknown paths: I find it really stimulating to transfer technology and experience from one filed to another. 3D printing allows all these things to empower your skills and enhances the hidden creativeness each of us has. 

Jenny: Who inspired you the most along this journey?

Matteo: I followed the work of many professionals working in veterinarian and human medicine , but no one inspired me more than Prof. Volta from Parma University. She always helped me in reaching the best I could, fostering my interest and ambitions for this particular application in the field of radiology and, more generally, medicine. She was also my thesis supervisor, so without her support I really do not know if I would be able to do this. I will always be grateful for being one of her students.

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Jenny: What motivates you the most for your work? 

Matteo: I am very curious and I love to do something that has not been done at all or doing it, but not in the way it is commonly performed. I like the idea of offering something different, something new. I like the possibility to perform a sort of lateral thinking. Also, being a veterinary physician lets you appreciate the great variety of natural shapes and solutions and let you work on many and sometimes very different types of anatomies and physiologies. Now, working also in the human field of this application, it is possible for me to see relations between the humans and other species and to perform a multi-species approach in my field of application. This is awesome.

Jenny: What is/are the biggest obstacle(s) in your line of work? If you have conquered them, what were your solutions? 

Matteo: Orthopedic specialty is very tough and rigid in terms of what you are expected to use in the context of surgery, perioperatively. The main difficulties were related to convincing surgeons to test or even try 3D printing in their surgical planning workflow. In private practice it is very difficult to sell to owners a 3D printed surgical planning, it is something that they usually do not understand or do not evaluate as “necessary”. This generates little interest from surgeons to try this approach. This goes against what I have experienced in my short career. In fact,  3D printed surgical planning is really helpful and impacts positively on the surgeons’ abilities. Once they test it, surgeons usually like it and ask for these 3D printed models for planning complicated surgeries. But the road to everyday employment or an integrated workflow considering 3D printing as a standard procedure for non-standard and non-common surgeries is still long to go. Fortunately, I have worked with veterinary surgeons that were open to innovation and I could successfully apply 3D printed models for surgical planning from orthopedics to maxillofacial surgeries. Were the surgeons not interested in this application,  I would have failed my research purposes easily and soon. 

Jenny: What do you think is (are) the biggest challenge(s) in 3D Printing/bio-printing? What do you think the potential solution(s) is (are)?

Matteo: The short-term challenge is standardization: personalized/custom medicine should not mean “anything goes”, so we need more in terms of standard requirements both for 3D hardware, software, and people involved in the process.

The middle-term challenge is the hardware cost-reduction, which is still an issue in terms of mass-scale use and employment and the 3D printing process speeds that could be still improved.

The long term is the printing of tissue and organs that could actually be employed on patients. 

Jenny: If you are granted three wishes by a higher being, what would they be? 

Matteo:

• Wolverine powers.
• Superman Body.
• Batman Money.

Jenny: What advice would you give to a smart driven college student in the “real world”? What bad advice you heard should they ignore? 

Matteo: The key to success is a multidisciplinary approach, don’t think in watertight compartments!

Everyone has something to teach us, listen to people around you and always decide with your brain.

There is no innovation if you don’t know the state of the art.

You must accept paid jobs only, slavery is never an option.

Be humble.

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In this episode of The Lattice podcast, we had the opportunity to chat with professor Ali Khademhosseini about his career, starting when he was a chemical engineering graduate student to becoming a full professor at Harvard, bicoastal move to UCLA, three-time entrepreneur, becoming an Amazon Fellow, to finally becoming the founder and director of the Terasaki Institute, a new educational research center that also wants to build young companies. While Ali has been incredibly productive in academia, his career trajectory is clearly towards academic entrepreneurship, an exciting concept to many scientists, especially in light of the pandemic and the rise of companies like Moderna. Given his success, I dug a little deeper into his secret sauce to achieve success. Fortunately, Ali was willing to share it with everyone as well as his evolving view on what is meaningful success to him and what he envisions his next achievement milestone. Since I knew Ali from his many works on biomaterials and 3D printing, we also discussed his vision for the field.

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Selected Excerpts From the Podcast:

How did you first encounter 3D printing?

“I did my Master’s degree in a stem cell lab. And as an engineer, I found that lots of biology were done in a way that’s not really controlled. In addition, there’s not nearly as much understanding of what the cells are doing. So I became really fascinated early on by trying to create more control over what the cells see in tissue culture or in a 3D environment. And that’s what got me excited about biomaterials and early on with microfabrication technologies to be able to control that microenvironment. and subsequent to that, when I started my own faculty position, I started getting more into some of these areas, and it’s specifically one of the things that I use, there’s a lot of microfabrication techniques to control gel structures and molding and light patterning and all that stuff.

It wasn’t until a few years after I started that, 3D Bioprinting actually started. And early on, I was really lucky because one of the early companies Organovo worked with us to really get a 3D printer into my lab. And that got us to work on that area. And after that, I started getting more and more attached to it. I started realizing that actually, this whole 3d bioprinting, which was actually going on few years before I got into it, was a really exciting field.

And then we had some really great postdocs that actually came to the lab and really grew that area. We developed a lot of 3D printers ourselves. And we had like, lots of really cool stuff come out of it. So it was really a progression from early on when I wanted to control cell microenvironment to really opportunistic things like working with Organovo, very early in their development.”

Who were instrumental along your career?

“I’ve always been able to get really involved and really passionate about what I do at the time. When I went to university, I started to understand more about why I’m going to a university why I’m actually doing science, I started making connections between different things that I learned, and knowing these connections became exciting for me. It wasn’t until I went to a lab that I actually had my first scientific mentor. So of course, you know, as you grew up, your parents are always there for you. And so they’re very influential.

But in the lab, I started having scientific mentors, and some of my early professors in Toronto were very inspirational. And when I went to MIT, when I interacted with Bob Langer, who’s really a historic figure, that was really a turning point, because I started to realize that, wow, you know, if a person can accomplish so much, then we should have no limits on ourselves.

And you know, we shouldn’t just say oh, this is the standard, this is the norm because you know him as one person that’s accomplished an incredible amount. So and then you start picking up things from the mentor, not necessarily by them telling you but just by osmosis and observation. So now, how you set up goals, how you actually go through step by step to achieve them, how you surround yourself with people who can help you. You know, all of those things are very important that I feel that during my graduate school and early faculty years, I actually picked up a lot of those skills.”

What’s the secret sauce of your success?

” The secret sauce is just working with a lot of good people. So and that’s really the only thing about it, I try not to be a rate-limiting step. And I try to take advantage of the opportunities that are around me, make sure that if there’s an idea or a publication or a person that can that I can help develop, then I will actually spend time on that and, and I try not to have too many, what I would call like wasted time, for example, things that I know are just useless, I try not to spend time on them, I try to kind of just quickly deviate and focus on something that I can do. And the other thing is really focusing on finishing.

I tell some of my folks, it’s not necessarily about how hard you work, because I know some people love to work hard. But working hard is one element of success, you have to work hard, and at the same time, be able to actually take that hard work and finish things.

And finishing is really just as important as starting things. So I’ve been very focused on finishing projects and having a very clear vision right off the bat, what is it that finish looks like? Because especially in science, you can continue exploring new things. So being able to have the vision and the end goal in mind, I think is really important in being productive.”

What did your experience at Amazon teach you?

How do you bring ideas from bench top to commercialization?

How to become a successful Academic Entrepreneur?

What are the major missions of the Terasaki Institute?

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About Our Guest for this Episode:

Prof. Ali Khademhosseini

Ali Khademhosseini is currently the CEO and Founding Director at the Terasaki Institute for Biomedical Innovation. Previously, he was a Professor of Bioengineering, Chemical Engineering, and Radiology at the University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA). He joined UCLA as the Levi Knight Chair in November 2017 from Harvard University where he was a Professor at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and faculty at the Harvard-MIT’s Division of Health Sciences and Technology (HST), Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), and as well as associate faculty at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering. At Harvard University, he directed the Biomaterials Innovation Research Center (BIRC) a leading initiative in making engineered biomedical materials. Dr. Khademhosseini is an Associate Editor for ACS Nano. He served as the Research Highlights editor for Lab on a Chip. He is a fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES), Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), Biomaterials Science and Engineering (FBSE), Materials Research Society (MRS), NANOSMAT Society, and American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). He is also the recipient of the Mustafa Prize ($500,000 prize) and is a member of the International Academy of Medical and Biological Engineering, Royal Society of Canada and Canadian Academy of Engineering, and National Academy of Inventors. He is an author on >650 peer-reviewed journal articles, editorials and review papers, >70 book chapters/edited books, and >40 patents/patent applications. He has been cited >74,000 times and has an H-index of 139. He has made seminal contributions to modifying hydrogels and developing novel biomaterial solutions for addressing pressing problems in healthcare. He has founded 2 companies, Obsidio Medical and Bioray. He received his Ph.D. in bioengineering from MIT (2005), and MASc (2001) and BASc (1999) degrees from the University of Toronto both in chemical engineering.

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The post Prof. Ali Khademhosseini: Academic Entrepreneur appeared first on 3DHeals.

In this fun Instagram Live we interviewed Robert Pugliese, who is the Director of Innovation Design at Thomas Jefferson University, and Jefferson Health where he co-founded the Health Design Lab, a creative space built with the purpose of merging together design-studio ethos with science-oriented discipline to foster innovation in healthcare. As usual, we started our conversation with his early career, the path to founding Health Design Lab, and how 3D printing played a role in all that. Robert’s 3D printing lab does not have fancy 3D printers, and he is a firm believer that having excellent design holds the key to solutions and 3D printing is a great tool to achieve that design. We were also fortunate to have a brief virtual tour of Robert’s lab and talked about a few super cool clinical cases Robert is working on at the moment.

Highlights of this podcast:

• How the Emergency Room was the starting point of Robert’s journey to becoming a design and 3D printing guru.
• What can low cost “prosumer” 3D printers do?
• Two cool cases Robert recently completed in the field of liver surgery and neurosurgery (on camera) plus a bonus mystery case.
• The medical student program at the Health Design Lab and the future of healthcare 3D printing ecosystem

Support the show 

Sponsor the show: info@3dheals.com

About our Guest Robert Pugliese:

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Robert S. Pugliese is Director of Innovation Design at Thomas Jefferson University and Jefferson Health where he co-founded the Health Design Lab, a creative space built with the purpose of merging together design-studio ethos with science-oriented discipline to foster innovation in healthcare. As somebody who enjoys empowering future health care providers to be change-makers, Robert leads programs that train students to be health design thinkers and innovators. A Doctor of Pharmacy (PharmD), Robert has spent over ten years practicing and teaching in Emergency Medicine. He believes that including both the patient and provider voice is vital to healthcare design, and he brings each of these perspectives to his work through his experience as a clinician and through his own journey of coping with insulin-dependent diabetes. Robert has presented on the intersection of healthcare and design at national venues such as SXSW and Stanford Medicine X and in 2019 he was selected as a Philadelphia Business Journal 40 Under 40 honoree. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Robert has used his unique experience to lead critical response efforts to overcome supply chain shortfalls and respond to community needs for testing and vaccination. In his spare time, Robert produces a weekly podcast and enjoys spending time with his wife and three daughters.

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The post Robert Pugliese: Design for Healthcare with 3DPrinting appeared first on 3DHeals.

In this episode of Instagram live, we had the pleasure to interview Jordi Tura the CEO and founder of Xkelet on his entrepreneur journey and on 3D printing immobilization orthotic devices since 2014, which started with his own broken arm. In addition to the technical aspects of Xkelet’s products, we also talked about how to grow a company ground up, how to work with doctors and healthcare systems, and how to improve unit economics to increase the adaption of the technologies, among others. 

Major talking points include:

How can an outsider create a product to have a product-market fit in healthcare? 

What was the first version of Xkelet braces look like?

What are the three major milestones of Xkelet technical and business development?

How did Jordi’s clinical collaborations contribute to the design and growth of Xkelet? 

How does Xkelet leverage software design to increase unit economics and productivity?

Complimentary hardware and material development to Xkelet software platform to optimize the speed and quality of scan-to-print process. 

What is the benefit of staying focused on one solution?

Additional Links:

The Lattice Podcast
Youtube
Instagram

About Our Guest:

@Xkelet has been working in the 3D printing immobilization orthotic space ever since 2014. CEO and Founder Jordi has met with many challenges along his journey to bring rapid and affordable user-friendly 3D printed orthosis focusing on the software step of the workflow.   

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3DHEALS IG Live Recordings: 3D Printing in Veterinary Medicine with Richard Doerer

The post No More Manual Work: Interview with Xkelet CEO and Co-founder Jordi Tura (Video) appeared first on 3DHeals.

Ali Khademhosseini is currently the CEO and Founding Director at the Terasaki Institute for Biomedical Innovation. Previously, he was a Professor of Bioengineering, Chemical Engineering, and Radiology at the University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA). He joined UCLA as the Levi Knight Chair in November 2017 from Harvard University where he was a Professor at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and faculty at the Harvard-MIT’s Division of Health Sciences and Technology (HST), Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) and as well as associate faculty at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering. At Harvard University, he directed the Biomaterials Innovation Research Center (BIRC) a leading initiative in making engineered biomedical materials. Dr. Khademhosseini is an Associate Editor for ACS Nano. He served as the Research Highlights editor for Lab on a Chip. He is a fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), Biomedical Engineering Society (BMES), Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC), Biomaterials Science and Engineering (FBSE), Materials Research Society (MRS), NANOSMAT Society, and American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).  He is also the recipient of the Mustafa Prize ($500,000 prize) and is a member of the International Academy of Medical and Biological Engineering, Royal Society of Canada and Canadian Academy of Engineering, and National Academy of Inventors. He is an author on >650 peer-reviewed journal articles, editorials, and review papers, >70 book chapters/edited books, and >40 patents/patent applications. He has been cited >74,000 times and has an H-index of 139. He has made seminal contributions to modifying hydrogels and developing novel biomaterial solutions for addressing pressing problems in healthcare. He has founded 2 companies, Obsidio Medical and Bioray. He received his Ph.D. in bioengineering from MIT (2005), and MASc (2001) and BASc (1999) degrees from the University of Toronto both in chemical engineering. Professor Khademhosseini will be speaking at our upcoming webinar The Art and Sciences of Bioink.

Jenny: When was the first encounter you had with 3D printing? What was that experience like? What were you thinking at that moment?

Ali: When I was in Grad school at MIT and I saw some of Bob Langers’ work on 3D Printing Tissues.

Jenny: What inspired you to start your career in bioprinting/biofabrication?

Ali: I had some interactions with companies that specialized in 3D printing. I was able to get some devices on them and got in some early publications/work.

Jenny: What is your vision on the intersection of 3D Printing and healthcare?

Ali: I envision that 3D printing can create a wide variety of products with a huge impact on healthcare. Such products, in the form of tissues and organs for tissue regeneration and drug testing, will bring a paradigm shift in the fields of personalized prosthetics, implants, and anatomical models.

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Jenny: Who inspired you the most along this journey in biofabrication/bioprinting?

Ali: Bob Langer

Jenny: What do you specialize in? What is your passion?

Ali: My research is focused on developing micro- and nano scale biomaterials to control cellular behavior with particular emphasis on developing engineered materials and systems for tissue engineering. In particular, I am passionate about developing various approaches to merge micro fabrication techniques such as 3D bioprinting, photo lithography, and microfluidics with hydrogel biomaterials for directing cell organization and generating complex 3D tissues. I am also developing ‘organ-on-a-chip’ systems that aim to mimic human response to various chemicals in vitro. In addition, my laboratory is developing technologies to control the formation of vascularized tissues with appropriate micro architectures as well as regulating stem cell differentiation within micro engineered systems.

Jenny: What is your vision on the intersection of 3D Printing and healthcare?

Ali: I envision that 3D printing can create a wide variety of products with a huge impact on healthcare. Such products, in the form of tissues and organs for tissue regeneration and drug testing, will bring a paradigm shift in the fields of personalized prosthetics, implants, and anatomical models.

Jenny: What inspired you to do what you do?

Ali: A passion for science and bringing technologies that make a change for the larger good is what inspired me. I have been lucky to have had my education under the shadows of some great scientists who have brought groundbreaking concepts and technologies from bench to bedside that continues to change the lives of millions.

Jenny: What motivates you the most for your work? 

Ali: To make an impact.

Jenny: What inspired you to do what you do?

Ali: A passion for science and bringing technologies that make a change for the larger good is what inspired me. I have been lucky to have had my education under the shadows of some great scientists who have brought groundbreaking concepts and technologies from bench to bedside that continue to change the lives of millions.

Jenny: What is the biggest obstacle(s) in your line of work? If you have conquered them, what were your solutions? 

Ali: I encounter obstacles all the time and I just try to find different solutions until I solve the problem. 

Jenny: What do you specialize in? What is your passion?

Ali: My research is focused on developing micro- and nano scale biomaterials to control cellular behavior with particular emphasis on developing engineered materials and systems for tissue engineering. In particular, I am passionate about developing various approaches to merge micro fabrication techniques such as 3D bioprinting, photo lithography, and microfluidics with hydrogel biomaterials for directing cell organization and generating complex 3D tissues. I am also developing ‘organ-on-a-chip’ systems that aim to mimic the human response to various chemicals in vitro. In addition, my laboratory is developing technologies to control the formation of vascularized tissues with appropriate microarchitectures as well as regulating stem cell differentiation within micro-engineered systems.

Jenny: What do you think is the biggest challenge in 3D bioprinting? What do you think the potential solution is?

Ali: The biggest challenge would be getting things that are functional. The solution would include a better understanding on biology.

Jenny: If you are granted three wishes by a higher being, what would they be? 

Ali: More time in a day.

Jenny: What advice would you give to a smart driven college student in the “real world”? What bad advice you heard should they ignore? 

Ali: The advice I would give is to get exposed to as many different things as possible. I would tell them to ignore any advice that says to solely focus on their studies – they also need to be aware of other things going on in the world. 

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Interview: Adam Jakus, Chief Technology of DimensionInx

3DHEALS2017: Bioprinting as the Future of H3DP

Bioart With Amy Karle: How 3D Printing Connects Art, Science, Humanity

The post Interview with Ali Khademhosseini, Terasaki Institute For Biomedical Innovation appeared first on 3DHeals.