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io9This Short Film About Memories Is Both Stunningly Gorgeous and Strangely Hypnotic
Raymond McCarthy Bergeron’s candy-colored short film re÷belief has won a huge array of festival awards, and it’s not hard to see why—it’s inventive and pulses with an unusual rhythm. This is due to the process he used to make it: 3D printed zoetropes. Here’s how the filmmaker, who created the film for his graduate thesis … Continued
By Cheryl Eddy -
ScienceSpace & SpaceflightNASA’s 3D-Printed Rocket Engine Spews Fire and 20,000 Pounds of Thrust
This NASA rocket is, bewilderingly, mainly built from 3D-printed parts. And yet pumped full of liquid hydrogen and oxygen it spews flame and generates an insane 20,000 pounds of thrust. NASA has been developing 3D-printed rocket engines for a while now. But in its latest test, it’s pieced together a rocket engine where 75 percent … Continued
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Tech News3D Printers Can Now Churn Out “Living” Blood Vessels
In a breakthrough that could lead to printable organs and an enhanced understanding of human physiology, researchers from Lawrence Livermore National Labs have 3D-printed functional blood vessels that look and function like the real thing. 3D bioprinters are similar to conventional 3D printers, but instead of using inert materials, they use “bio-ink:” basic structural building … Continued
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Tech NewsThese 3D-Printed Pictures Could Help the Blind Experience Classic Art
The majority of the world’s most famous artworks lie on two-dimensional canvas, which makes them impossible for the visually impaired to enjoy. But a team from Helsinki is trying to change that, with 3D-printed versions of famous works, that blind people can touch and feel. The Unseen Art project is intended to make art more … Continued
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Tech NewsA Clever 3D Printer Fixes Printing Mistakes Instead of Starting Again From Scratch
The advent of 3D printing completely revolutionized the prototyping stage of designing a new product. But while turnaround times for revisions or changes are now much faster with a 3D printer, they can be even faster if the printer fixes flawed prototypes instead of reprinting them from scratch. Researchers from the Hasso-Plattner-Institut’s Human Computer Interaction … Continued
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ScienceHealth
You Could One Day Take 3D-Printed Medicine Tailor-Made to Your Body
In the near future, being prescribed the perfect pill that’ll zap away your illness, free of side effects, could soon come to your medicine cabinet courtesy of 3D printing. The American Heart Association says that researchers have recently used a computer algorithm to do just that. They plugged in patients’ medical info into a computer, … Continued
By Bryan Lufkin -
Tech NewsSorry, Hair Club—We Can Finally 3D-Print Hair
Could this be the ‘killer app’ for 3D printers that finally makes them a must-have device for every home? Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University’s Human-Computer Interaction Institute have found a way to use 3D printers to create realistic-looking hair, bristles, and other fibers. Goodbye crappy smartphone cases and other plastic trinkets, hello to home-made toupees … Continued
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Tech NewsAn Upgraded Tape Gun Lets You Quickly Build Life-Size Wireframe Prototypes
How many times have you battled a tape measure to try and figure out a if new piece of furniture will actually fit in your living room? With the ProtoPiper—a heavily upgraded tape gun—you can quickly build a full-scale mockup of almost any object and know for sure how big it will be. Developed by … Continued
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ScienceHealth
This Miniature Medical Device Measures Five of Your Blood’s Vital Signs
This tiny 3D-printed device doesn’t look all that, but it manages to keep track of five different substances floating around in your blood and sling the results to a nearby tablet using Bluetooth. Created by researchers at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland, the device keeps an eye on the metabolites glucose, lactate … Continued
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Tech NewsAdidas Wants to 3D-Print Running Shoes That Perfectly Fit Your Feet
What if you could walk in a store, jog on a treadmill, and walk out with a pair of shoes that are custom manufactured for your feet and gait? That’s exactly what Adidas wants to do with its Futurecraft 3D project. And unlike most of the trash produced by 3D printing, the shoes look pretty … Continued
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Tech News
If Your Chipotle Burrito Looks Smaller Soon, Blame 3D Printing (Updated: Chipotle Says Portion Sizes Won’t Change)
Chipotle isn’t known for stingy serving sizes, but people have been coming up with tricks to maximize the size of their burritos for years. But our days of gloriously unhealthy oversized heaps of Tex-Mex fast food may be numbered: Chipotle has enlisted a 3D printing company to fight the scourge of overstuffed tortillas. Update 3:52 … Continued
By Kate Knibbs -
ScienceSpace & Spaceflight
This Is How Foster + Partners Wants to 3D-Print a Martian Settlement
The acclaimed architecture firm Foster + Partners has unveiled a series of images that depict plans for a 3D-printed settlement that could be built on Mars. The designs have been shortlisted as one of the finalists in the 3D Printed Habitat Challenge organised by America Makes and NASA. They describe a 93-square-meter base which would … Continued
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Tech NewsThis Energy-Sharing Solar House and Hybrid Car Are the Ultimate Off-The-Grid Fantasy
What if you could live and drive without having to depend on traditional energy or fuel? That’s what a new prototype from Oak Ridge National Lab means to do–and it brings new meaning to “off-grid” living. Yesterday, Oak Ridge unveiled something called the Additive Manufacturing Integrated Energy demonstration project (AMIE), which it launched only one … Continued
By Attila Nagy -
Tech News
This Popular and Super Futuristic 3D Printer Is Now Also Easy To Use
3D printers don’t need help sounding futuristic. They take digital content and make it physical in a 3D space. People have used the term Star Trek’s “Replicator” as a distant scifi descendent of 3D printers more times than I can count. But no 3D printer seems quite as future as the Form printer, which uses … Continued
By Darren Orf -
Tech News
You Can Print Your Own Homo Naledi Specimens
If you’re excited about last week’s announcement of a new human-like species discovered in South Africa, you can get your hands on the specimens — sort of. You can print your own 3D replicas of Homo naledi and several other important hominin finds. Anthropologist Lee Berger and his colleagues found 91 specimens, which they say … Continued
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Tech NewsPrivacy and Security
You Can Now 3D-Print Your Own TSA Master Keys
TSA-recognized locks provide little more than a false sense of security. That’s not news. It is news, however, that some hacker type has uploaded the CAD files of the agency’s master keys to Github, so that anybody can 3D-print them at home. Let the stealing begin! Just kidding, please don’t break into other people’s luggage. … Continued
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Tech NewsThe World’s First 3D-Printed Titanium Rib Cage Is a Medical Marvel
It sounds like something straight out of a comic book, but after losing his sternum and part of his rib cage to cancer, a 54-year-old Spanish man received the world’s first 3D-printed chest prosthetic made from lightweight, but incredibly strong, titanium. Titanium implants aren’t new, but replacing large sections of the rib cage is tricky. … Continued
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Tech NewsThis 3D-Printed Working Model of a 787’s Jet Engine Has Impressive Thrust
Given the challenges with precision, building functional machines with a household 3D printer isn’t easy. And that’s why it’s all the more impressive that someone on the RC Groups forum has used a 3D printer to make a fully-functional scale model of a Boeing 787’s GE-built turbofan jet engine. Harcoreta’s scale replica, which includes over … Continued
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Tech News
Robotic Microfish Can Sense and Remove Toxins From Their Environment
In the not-too-distant future, tiny robotic fish could be cruising around inside our our bodies, delivering drugs and cleaning up toxins. This week, engineers at the University of San Diego unveiled the first prototype: a chemically powered, magnetically controlled swimmer. It’s called the “microfish,” and true to its name, it looks quite a bit like … Continued
By Maddie Stone -
Tech NewsCheaper, Faster, Better: The Plan to Build an Open Source Prosthetic Hand
Over the past five years, 3D printers have gotten cheaper, hardware has gotten smaller, and tinkerer communities have boomed. All of that has spurred a renaissance of prosthetic design, bolstered by an open source ethos and crowdfunded budgets. Robotic prosthetics, as you might expect, are still expensive, complicated, and time-consuming to build. But a growing … Continued