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3D Bioprinters Could Make Enhanced, Electricity-Generating 'Superorgans'
New submitter meghan elizabeth (3689911) writes Why stop at just mimicking biology when you can biomanufacture technologically improved humans? 3D-printed enhanced "superorgans"—or artificial ones that don't exist in nature—could be engineered to perform specific functions beyond what exists in nature, like treating disease. Already, a bioprinted artificial pancreas that can regulate glucose levels in diabetes patients is being developed. Bioprinting could also be used to create an enhanced organ that can generate electricity to power electronic implants, like pacemakers.
I am keeping up with medical technology, and frankly the amount of academic stuff that actually reaches the man on the street is so minuscule that anyone who has reached middle age can forget about that Revolutionary New Thing Coming Soon, because it won't be. While the quantity of medical research done has never been greater, advances in the practice of medicine have not been slower at any time in the past century. It's not just that we've solved all the elementary problems, but that research is now mostly directed by the businesses which sponsor it - and, contrary to popular belief, it is big, centralised, production-directed systems which tend to be quickest at completing the waterfall from research to implementation.