CN/EN
CN/EN
Desktop Health, the medical 3D printing arm
of Desktop Metal, has announced the launch of PrintRoll, a rotating build
platform that can produce intelligent tubular solutions for the body’s
vascular, digestive, respiratory and reproductive channels on the 3D-Bioplotter
bioprinting system.
The 3D-Bioplotter is an extrusion-based 3D
printer that processes liquids, melts, pastes, gels, or other materials,
including cells, through a needle tip on a Swiss-made, 3-axis gantry system
with high accuracy and temperature, sterility and design controls according to
Desktop Health.
3D-Bioplotter offers eight printheads with
what the company says is the widest range of temperatures in bioprinting, from
2°C to 500°C, enabling complex, multi-material medical parts. The PrintRoll
add-on feature to the Bioplotter has been in development since 2019 as part of
a collaboration with Johanes Gutenberg University Mainz, a public research
university.
Ric Fulop, Founder and CEO of Desktop Metal
said: “We are proud to offer the first bioprinting tool specifically designed
to develop medical solutions for the thousands of miles of channels found in
the human body. Desktop Health exists to deliver 3D printing solutions that
improve patient lives, and we are confident that PrintRoll, offered exclusively
on the 3D-Bioplotter, will enable all-new regenerative innovations. We look
forward to seeing what our customers will create next with this exciting new
tool.”
PrintRoll attaches to the modular build
plate of the 3D-Bioplotter and features a motor-driven rotating mandrel with
spring-loaded, easily exchangeable drums of different sizes. As the PrintRoll
rotates, the printhead moved back and forth depositing material on the surface
in the desired design.
The product comes with a 10mm diameter
drum, with 20mm and 40mm sizes also available, and are designed to accommodate
the development of solutions for a variety of human channels, which vary based
on age and gender.
“Up until now, the creation of thin-walled cylindrical devices with complex structured walls has been challenging to accomplish with regenerative materials, such as hydrogels,” said Nicole Black, Ph.D., VP of Biomaterials and Innovation at Desktop Health. “With the PrintRoll, materials are patterned directly on top of a substrate that rolls as the printhead also moves, supporting the deposited layers and therefore expanding the palette of materials that can be 3D printed into these important structures, Following printing, devices can be removed from the PrintRoll, leaving high-resolution and reproducible parts that customers have come to expect from the 3D-Bioplotter.”
