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Kidney Printer
smitty777 writes "Dr. Anthony Atala of the Wake Forest Institute of Regenerative Medicine demonstrated his technique for printing a new kidney. The early stage technology involves scanning the patient's current organ, and actually printing the organ directly into the patient. He refutes reported claims that it's just a kidney shaped mold, as reported by some. While still in the early stages, it does hold promise that we will be able to use this technology for actual transplants in the future."
HP's ink cartridges cost a kidney, new printer can actually print kidneys.
The circle of life is complete.
Mod me down, my New Earth Global Warmingist friends!
before we can print a new Milla Jovovich?
"goodbye and hello, as always" ~Prince Corwin, from Zelazny's Amber series
just took on a whole new meaning.
I just caught up and bought a 3d printer, and now they come out with a kidney printer... it's a never ending cycle.
In my experience, print heads clog more often than I run out of ink. Therefore, neither of those methods is good. The right solution is to make printers that flush out their own heads with an appropriate solvent (e.g. an isopropanol tank) every time you shut them down so that the heads don't get dried ink inside them in the first place. Moving the print head to the ink tank is just shifting the problem around.
Back on topic, can you imagine this sort of printer getting clogged? Whoops. We accidentally put a few of somebody else's kidney cells inside your kidney along with your own. That's gonna be a tumor in a few years, but for now, enjoy your life while it lasts.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
TFS: "He refutes reported claims that it's just a kidney shaped mold, as reported by some"
TFA: "Wake Forest has since clarified media inaccuracies in a press release, stating Dr. Atla printed "a kidney-shaped mold", not a functioning kidney."
Wake Forest has since clarified media inaccuracies in a press release, stating Dr. Atla printed "a kidney-shaped mold", not a functioning kidney.
Where's the link for Dr. Atala contradicting Wake Forest?
I hear it costs an arm and a leg!
From the summary:
He refutes reported claims that it's just a kidney shaped mold, as reported by some.
From the linked story:
Wake Forest has since clarified media inaccuracies in a press release, stating Dr. Atla printed "a kidney-shaped mold", not a functioning kidney.
Did he print an actual kidney or not. I am guessing not.
The "kidneys" produced could not be printed into the patient, they're not functional.
You take an inkjet printer, load the tank with (organ specialized) human cells and print the organ layer by layer with a filler material to hold it all together. The best source of human cells would be stem cells(made from that person to prevent immune system hazards), though taking cells from an existing kidney might work in some cases. It would work best done outside the body at least till the glue dries. Should work for most of the organs in the human body, including muscle and tendons. stem cell research is almost at the point this can be done, eliminating the need for donor organs. In theory this would work for bones as well, allowing you to print an arm or leg. In about 25 years we'll have the stem cell/printer tech to print a whole person with this tech (or build an android that looks/feels the same), though i'm sure that will be banned by the religious extremists. If AI ever works techno-nerds living in their parents basements will finally .
How do they taste? How about with some fava beans and a nice chianti?
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
TFA makes it sound like a printer for a much simpler organ (bladder) has been used in at least one human trial. I wonder if there is anything published in medical literature about this kind of thing? (I'm not in medicine or biotech, so I wouldn't necessarily know).
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
Wish this guy would test the technology using goose liver. It will save the poor birds a lot of grief, assure French restaurants a steady supply of fois gras, satisfy PETA and will get to the market sooner.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
http://www.ted.com/talks/anthony_atala_printing_a_human_kidney.html
You can watch the actual video here.
3D Printing Tips and Tricks at Zheng3.com
I might be interested in a liver in 30 years--Government based IT work is enough to drive anyone to drink.
That works up to a certian point. It will force raw material price through the roof, while manufactuing gets cut out.
In the end economics always wins
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
No the correct solution is to not use ink but instead a toner based technology. Inkjets are pure garbage.
What the f@(% does that mean?
Some time in the future, will we be striving for the kidneyless office and be content with viewing virtual kidneys on our monitors? After all, real kidneys are wasteful and harmful to the planet. Aren't they?
http://www.acetonestudio.com
Yep, inkjets were are cheap stopgap that should have only been used long enough for laser printers to come down in price. That time has come and passed. There is no longer a good reason for inkjets to exist in the consumer market.
Extremely high resolution photos can still be printed with inkjets.
Of course, if you want glossy photos, you might as well just print them online to a printer at your local walgreens, walmart, or other store. The quality will be better and the cost cheaper unless you are printing a huge number...no wait, still cheaper.
Never mind, then.
Why not allow people to sell their organs to help cover the expensive costs of funerals. More old folks would love to sell their internal organs so as to help their loved ones they leave behind not being burdened by having to pay for their funeral.
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...
The much more obvious reason why there is a shortage of organs, and why organs are so expensive, is that it is illegal to sell one's own organs. An elderly person has no incentive to donate his organs on death, if his surviving loved ones do not profit from it.
See, someone less out of touch with reality who doesn't think capitalism solves all problems would suggest that you should have to opt-out of organ donation rather than opt in. That would solve the problem WITHOUT encouraging organ theft, desperate people selling their organs while still alive, and all sorts of other hideous abuses.
Oh, but wait, then it would be harder for anyone to make millions in organ trading... well then never mind, it's clearly socialism and that's evil.
Do you own your own body? I would imagine you would like to believe that you do. If you think that a woman owns her own body and can do what she would like with it ie. Abortion, then she and any one else with sentience would thereby have the rights to their own body to do with it as they please. This includes selling parts off of it and transferring their property after their deaths, it. posthumous selling of their own internal organs. It isn't a capitalism issue, it is a body ownership issue.
Do you own your own body? Or do you think the "state" is somehow "entitled" to own your own body.
If you think the state owns your body, have fun with that philosophy as the state can now do whatever they want with you.
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...
Do you own your own body? I would imagine you would like to believe that you do. If you think that a woman owns her own body and can do what she would like with it ie. Abortion, then she and any one else with sentience would thereby have the rights to their own body to do with it as they please. This includes selling parts off of it and transferring their property after their deaths, it. posthumous selling of their own internal organs. It isn't a capitalism issue, it is a body ownership issue.
Do you own your own body? Or do you think the "state" is somehow "entitled" to own your own body.
If you think the state owns your body, have fun with that philosophy as the state can now do whatever they want with you.
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...
An elderly person has no incentive to donate his organs on death, if his surviving loved ones do not profit from it.
Please, do continue.
Profit for loved ones? Altruism is already the motivating factor for people who have become organ donors. The selfish aren't going to give up their organs for compensation to their heirs (who already get a hefty life insurance payout). If you want to buy organs, let people take out a reverse mortgage on their body. I suspect that would work better.
There are other mitigating factors, the biggest of which, is how many people it takes to produce an adequate supply of the material to satisfy the needs of the population as a whole. If it is adequately difficult to produce in quantity that everyone basically needs to manufacture their own, then the economy doesn't change. However, if, for the sake of contrast, an adequate supply for the world can be produced by two people in an afternoon, then we run into a different problem. The new product obsoletes an entire industry, and with it, a great chunk of the world's income. Factory workers make up a great deal of the world's population, and when their income goes away, that spreads to have an impact on the service industry, the entertainment industry and on outward, like a cancer. Before long, virtually the only people with an income to purchase the raw material, are the people who produce it.
I'm not exactly sure how it works out from there. Either we take an altruistic approach, such as in the Star Trek universe, where every man works to the betterment of world and self, or we take on a more complex economy that has a substantially different balancing point.
Learning about brewing beer, by brewing beer.
If you think the state owns your body, have fun with that philosophy as the state can now do whatever they want with you.
Well I think the problem here is that straw men have no organs, but if they did, ownership of said organs would be a very interesting issue. Maybe I'd even make a statement on who owns straw man organs. But I didn't, did I?
Alternatively, the state is placing limitations on the actions that doctors are allowed to take.
No need to tell you what to do with your body when we can just tell the doctors what not to do.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Would you want the organs of an old person? Yea.. I wouldn't either and neither does anyone else. There is no market for the organs of old people. You might be able to make a case for skin.. but even then I'm not sure. They won't even take your bone marrow if you are over 55.
Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats. -HLM
It gets the command to print a new kidney.
It reports that it will be ready it 48 hours.
It flies down to Mexico.
Some unsuspecting tourist wakes up in a bathtub of ice.
You get a new kidney.
If i want to sell my internal Organs after I die, I already have the inherent right to do, it is the government who is infringing already on those rights.
Tsukasa: All I really want, is to be left alone...
Not really. This is a matter of law. You can own your own body and still not do things with it that are illegal.
Personally, I think that this is a good idea. People can be pressured into all sorts of things. Selling parts of your body should not be one of those.
Oh, I see, the inherent rights of a corpse. Right.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Odd coincidence, but I didn't that episode. The actual inspiration came from a poster on the DMV wall the other day, which I saw while renewing my license.
There are some problems that relate to the concept of ownership. This is not one of those problems.
We in the real world decided some time ago that there are many issues where a pragmatic approach, ignoring philosophical consistency, gets the job done and allows us to get on with making the world a nicer place to live.
Is 1563649 a prime number?
Let's keep profits out of the organ donor process. The last thing we need are, "Need money fast? Donate a kidney! Don't worry. You have two of them!"
I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it. -- Groucho Marx
Inkjets are good for printing on transparent film and non-bendable objects.
He's probably just worried about a sub-prime organ market.
Help fight poverty: Punch a poor person.
when the alternative is certain death, yes, I and most people will happily take the organ.
No one wants an 80 year old warn out liver, kidney, heart, etc. Instead they one one from the healthy 25 year old that just ran his motorcycle into the side of a bus.
Yes, but at the cost of surgery and on going care is it worth it for a worn out organ that may at best have a few more years of limited use left?
Show me a glossy CD/DVD label I can print with a laser. That's why I have inkjet. The matte labels are too thick and add too much weight unbalance to the disc.
Why not print something you can sell to everyone? T-Bone steaks! If you think your printer cartridge cost is bad now, wait until you try to buy the kidney favored one!
An elderly person has no incentive to donate his organs on death, if his surviving loved ones do not profit from it.
The elderly person may have nothing of value to donate.
I think you're being overly generous in assigning a full half-share to the father. Compared to the mother's contribution to the process, the father's part is negligible. Some minor compensation may be in order, but certainly nothing more. Moreover, regardless of the division of ownership, no one has any right to demand that someone else use their body in a certain way; that includes continuing a pregnancy. At most you can seek compensation for a broken contract, assuming you can show that one existed in the first place.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
No, I'll stick to Canon inkjet printers. Separate printhead and cartridges, in the "better" models even separate tanks for the colors.
In the TED talk, he blames things like "we're living longer" for the shortage of organs.
Improvements in trauma medicine, vehicular safety, and workplace safety are the biggest causes for the shortage of organs.
Things like seatbelt laws, motorcycle helmet laws, and OSHA aren't helping either. Catastrophic fatal injuries (especially head trauma) are jackpots for donor organs. Crass, but true.
That's a good idea. Only problem is that decent wide format color laser printers start in the neighborhood of two grand. You can burn through an awful lot of print heads before laser pays for itself unless you are content with 8.5x11 or smaller.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
No, people would still make millions in organ trading (and installation), just not the people who grew them.
I see nothing wrong with people selling their own organs, and I seriously doubt it would diminish what is already a minuscule pool of donors.
Anyway, most people make an explicit choice when they receive their driver's license or state ID, which could just as easily be called "out-out" as "opt-in."
https://www.eff.org/https-everywhere
Heh, hehe heheheh heheheheheheh....
He said 'hard disk'.
Heh, hehe heheheh heheheheheheh....
If telephones are outlawed, then only outlaws will have telephones.
Is this why 80 year olds ride the bus?
The US government have made it clear that we have no inalienable rights; any we do not defend vigorously will be taken.
the rational thing to do would be to eliminate the concept of organ "donation" usable organs should be taken when a person dies, they are dead and do not have rights anymore, unlike the people who are alive and awaiting organs.
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
the end result would be a purely creative, intellectual, and service economy, much like that of the united states of america. most likely stability would not be maintained during the transition and one of two outcomes would occur, either the first and last successful marxist state would occur, where living space was apportioned out to people in a fair and, due to the very low threshold of other needs, people actually do work towards personal and social betterment.
the other possibility would be corporate control, starting with draconian restrictions on the proliferation and use of replication technology, followed by a capitalist dystopia where the ultracorps who controlled the early stages of replication tech used their massive market advantage to buy up most of everything that will not be rendered obsolete by replication, mineral rights and property. typical rental agreements will require turning over copyrights and patents to the corporate landlords, and copyright laws will be adjusted to allow such requirements and to provide prison time for anyone violating such an agreement.
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
Your question is based on a false premise. Living bodies are not ownable.
"Your" body is the thing that does the verb that is you. Flight does not own an arrow, shining does not own the sun, a Em7 chord does not own a guitar. The action and the subject are inseparable.
Property, on the other hand, is a relationship that is separable. You do not own your body. So long as your body is being a living human being, no one does or can.
Once you are dead -- once your body is no longer being you -- by natural default the inanimate remains of your body are finders-keepers. It takes an act of the state to transform the unowned corpse that was formerly you into legally recognized property.
It's entirely appropriate for the state to say, "By default, we're going to transform part of this corpse into property in a way that helps save lives, by giving it to this doctor so that he can make those bit help do the verb that is someone else (at which point it will cease being property); and the remainder into property in a way that helps the decedent's family and friends deal with their grief by using it in some sort of funeral rites."
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
Would you want the organs of an old person? Yea.. I wouldn't either and neither does anyone else. There is no market for the organs of old people. You might be able to make a case for skin.. but even then I'm not sure. They won't even take your bone marrow if you are over 55.
Not so. I saw a piece on TV some time ago about a USA doctor who was taking organs from donors that would normally be considered too old, and giving them to older recipients who would normally be at the bottom of the transplant list because of their age.
For example they may take a heart from an otherwise healthy 60 year old and give it to a 70 year old. This doctor had done a number of these transplants with good long term survival rates. Of course you could argue about the ethics of spending that much money on an oldie with only a few years to live, but their family may disagree.
Nice job /.
Stop pirating movies!
j/k
Penis printing facilities. Price is measure in standard page sizes: A4, A3, A2, A1, US Letter size, or Foolscap.
Task Mangler
Reality:
"Reports in the media that Dr. Anthony Atala printed a real kidney at the TED conference in Long Beach, Calif., are completely inaccurate. At the conference, Dr. Atala used a new type of technology to print a kidney-shaped mold and explained how one day – many years from now – the technology might be used to print actual organs."
http://www.wfubmc.edu/Research/WFIRM/Media-Reports-on-Kidney-Printing-Inaccurate.htm
Slashdot:
"The early stage technology involves scanning the patient's current organ, and actually printing the organ directly into the patient. He refutes reported claims that it's just a kidney shaped mold, as reported by some."
No one wants an 80 year old warn out liver, kidney, heart, etc. Instead they one one from the healthy 25 year old that just ran his motorcycle into the side of a bus.
Ok, new pricing scheme:
Pay the young healthy people with risky lifestyles a small reverse mortgage until their age or health determines that the organ is no longer useful at which point the organ traders write off the loss. I stress a small reverse mortgage to prevent abuses of the system from both ends. For example I recall some sci-fi setting has had people buy their organs back, or part with them.
There are two reasons for the organ shortage: 1- most people take theirs to the grave. 2- sick people outnumber the dead, so the supply(from recently dead) will always be smaller than the number with (possibly long term) illness. I would suggest negative option billing. Instead of signing up to donate your organs (then having your next of kin second guess you), we assume that everyone wants to donate their body parts unless they register, and harvest all available parts at death unless they have done so (and don't ask the next of kin). I'd also suggest that anyone who registers against donation would be put at the back of the line for recipient organs (or taken off the list).
+1, Funny
It toppled the scarcity-based economy since everything could be instantly copied for cheap
Ahh, but post scarcity economies have a big advantage over scarcity economies: plenty of stuff .
I cannot comprehend the thought process that would lead one to the conclusion that an entire population not needing to work for a living would be a problem.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
Repo Men?
While I understand the aversion to elderly organs, I think your perspective might change if you were actually in the market for replacement parts. Nobody wants organs from an old person, but some people out there may need them. If your liver is failing, the docs give you a month to live, and the only compatible liver available is from a 60-year-old who died of a heart attack, are you really going say no?
Designing the "molds" and running the printing process itself (managing printers, dealing with the raw material), etc would account for the manufacturing sector of this society
I admit I'm not a Star Trek expert, but I think this was the whole point of Star Trek replicators, to show these things' effect on economy (also by contrasting with latinum and the Ferengi)
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
Seconded, and I'll add Epson to that. Their six-color printers are very nice, and reman cartridges are great if you get them from a reputable dealer.
Or the eyes from a suicide victim. My brother's eyes brought sight to two blind people, and the rest of his organs were given to research, as per his wishes. Yes, he was a scientist.
Grand idea, except that many cultures and religions have rules against desecrating the body after death. It may be rational to harvest when the heart stops, but it's not realistic.
I'd also suggest that anyone who registers against donation would be put at the back of the line for recipient organs (or taken off the list).
You do realize that communism, while good on paper most of the time, never works in reality right? There's this little thing called "human compassion" that will put your conscientious objector in a position based on his need and not your indignation.
To put it another way, communism will only work when humanity is completely replaced by autonomous machines without emotion.
Show me a glossy CD/DVD label I can print with a laser. That's why I have inkjet. The matte labels are too thick and add too much weight unbalance to the disc.
There were (and probably still are) ones that did this. The Lexmark Color 1200 was one such printer. Single pass color printing, fast speeds, and selection of normal finish to glossy finish where it would fuse the fuser oil onto/into the toner. The results were pretty impressive. Not photo-glossy, but more of inbetween photo matte and photo glossy. Looked even better on glossy laser paper (which is sold for various color lasers... I have a big stack of it here by HP for the HP printers, such as our Color 4600). Such paper comes as labels, photo paper, letter sized paper, brochure paper, CD inserts, etc. And of course, cheaper to run than an inkjet (and supporting duplex and 13x19 printing).
So... there's both printer and paper/labels/etc covered.
Now, as for printing a CD label (ie: for on the disk), I think those things are terrible (the labels). and avoid them at all costs. Printing directly on a CD/DVD (even if not as glossy) looks much more professional - and for a truly professional look, buying a true CD/DVD printer (not an inkjet with a CD print tray) is even better.
StarTrekPhase2 - The Five Year Mission Continues!
Give me a heads-up when they can print hearts and brains. I may be able to get a couple of government contracts. No, they don't need to be bleeding edge hi-res for that.
Free, as in your money being freed from the confines of your account.
As I understand it... it's not up to you. The medical system has standards for such things and they won't accept an organ from a person after they are so old because of a much higher risk of the transplant failing.
Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats. -HLM
Now, as for printing a CD label (ie: for on the disk), I think those things are terrible (the labels). and avoid them at all costs. Printing directly on a CD/DVD (even if not as glossy) looks much more professional - and for a truly professional look, buying a true CD/DVD printer (not an inkjet with a CD print tray) is even better.
The matte labels look terrible, and I avoid those at all costs. The super-thin glossy ones look like they are part of the disc. If you do full-color printing, the gloss coating ensures that you don't see individual ink drops. It looks like 4-color printing directly on the disc (minus the ability to have the shiny show through).
Weren't the printheads for Epson printers almost as expensive as a new printer, sometimes even more expensive? For Canon, they are available for a halfway reasonable price (or were when I last checked some years ago). I also prefer Canon because they are the company with the least (technical and legal) actions against refilling/remaking.
Yep, inkjets were are cheap stopgap that should have only been used long enough for laser printers to come down in price. That time has come and passed. There is no longer a good reason for inkjets to exist in the consumer market.
So what, you want kidneys with frikkin' lasers? I mean, print me a frikkin' bone already!
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.