The medical community is approaching a quantum leap forward with the development of 3-D bioprinting. A team of doctors, technicians, and researchers is standing at the forefront of this breakthrough technology.
Initially working with the BioAssembly Tool or BAT, they have begun experimenting on the printing of biomaterial. They are now working methodically towards successfully printed out a working human heart. This team is also working towards laying the groundwork for printing with stem cells that could potentially raise regenerative medicine to unprecedented heights. They are hoping that the combination of 3-D bioprinting and the use of stem cells will help repair, or potentially replace, human organs or tissues that have been damaged, advance surgical medicine, and ultimately give patients better outcomes after dealing with illnesses or injuries.
Researchers have been running into several challenges with using the BAT, but are now presented with a new solution that will accelerate bioprinting significantly. The BAB, or BioAssemblyBot, is a six-axis robot that's far more accurate than the three-axis robot that was used with the previous BAT machine. The BAB also runs on more sophisticated software that allows the research team to scan and manipulate the 3-D models the organs or tissues that can be used for diagnosis. These scans can then be used to print on the BAB.
Dr. Jay Hoying, Division Chief of Cardiovascular Therapeutics at the Cardiovascular Innovation Institute in Louisville, Kentucky says, "It's a big step forward in the capability and technology of bioprinting, but what someone like me is really excited about is now it enables me to do so much more."
The developer of the BAB, Advanced Solutions CEO, Michael Golway said of the technology that his company is advancing, "What's been really interesting to me is that we are on a trajectory here where we're really treating biology as more of an information technology. Instead of just the hard-core traditional discoveries that biology has been tracking on, if we can translate that into IT, we can take that experimentation and rapidly start looking at optimization... the exponential curve is already there but this technology allows you to take the next step."
The researchers from the Cardiovascular Innovation Institute are impressed and optimistic that Golway's technological solution will get them infinitely closer to their goal of creating the world's first "total bioficial heart."