Print your food, starting with Bacon

The cartridges are washed out and refilled with suspensions of living cells; the software that controls the characteristics of the ink is reprogrammed and you're good to go. Boland and Mironov use layers of "thermo-reversable" gel to build up three-dimensional structures like tubes—capillaries, to use the medical term. When the tiny droplets, or clumps, of cells came together closely, they fused; the gel can be easily removed, leaving a tube of tissue.

Just as printers contain inks of different colors, so tissue printers could contain different cell types to create complex structures.

Now, it seems to me that a tube or complex living organ is a pretty complicated structure. Why not practice with a simpler, more two-dimensional form of muscle tissue—like bacon, for instance? Nothing like fresh bacon.


LiveScience

Pretty cool in my opinion.
Be really cool the day we can print out a meal.


Coments, Opinions?

Thats cool, Priniting seems that it will stay with us for centuries...I've read about every thing from using a big printer like machine that builds house by using cement instead of ink. And then theres those 3-D printers that you can print out a part for something if it broke.
Printing has a bright future.


Todays slogan: "Give a man a fish, feed him for a day, But teach a man to fish, and feed him for life"

Future slogan: "Just hit Re-Print"

This would be bigger than Gutenberg's press if they perfected it!
That is just wierd, but cool at the same time, I guess it would just be a quicker way at "Maturing" the cells into what you are intending to grow.
This reminds me of the movie The Fifth Element where they "printed" Leeloo in a matter of minutes. No more having to grow stem cells!


I don't know about the whole Pseudoflesh thing though, I prefer the real animal when it comes to eating something!

[edit on 7-2-2006 by DustintheWind]

That is so totally weird. I like it!


Right now unfortunatly, it takes about 18 hours to print a small part. I'm not likely to wait that long for breakfast.

But the technology will be awesome in the near future. You betcha.

This is like the next step to what Neil Gershenfeld has been talking about.

Personal Fabrication

This will be very cool when it becomes commonplace in every home.

and you think ink cartridges are expensive now...

I don't think when the day comes when this is in every home, Cartriges will be used. I believe the raw materials will be piped into the home like Natural Gas and Water is today. It would require alot of infrastructure but it's totally doable.

These kinds of ideas have circulated around for decades since the first thought of using such a technique for quantum (nano) engineering was established. This sounds more like a pipe dream to me.

But you could print that pipe... and that dream!!

Sounds more like the next big tech in the burn ward.

Originally posted by Frosty
These kinds of ideas have circulated around for decades since the first thought of using such a technique for quantum (nano) engineering was established. This sounds more like a pipe dream to me.

Tell that to the Scientists at MIT's center for Bits and Atoms

Really now, they have already succeeded in printing capilaries and simple 2d protean structures. Soft Molecular Manufacturing will be alot easier to figure out then Hard Drexlerian Molecular Manufacturing.

[edit on 9-2-2006 by sardion2000]

Sometimes it's the insane stupid things like printable bacon that lead to really useful advances, don't ask me for an example I just feel compelled to defend the concept of printable food.

Hey honey can you print me out a falafal!

Spiderj