Manufacture of handheld leather printers to handle severe burns

A team of researchers in Canada has successfully developed a handheld 3D skin printer to handle severe burns by 'printing' skin cells directly onto the wound.

3D handheld leather printer.

Although this machine is in the early stages of development, it provides a new way to treat patients with extensive burns. The research results were just published February 4, in the journal Biofovenation .

Professor Axel Günther, of the University of Toronto, said that in the past, to treat severe burns, doctors had to take skin from another area of ​​the patient's body to graft into the burned skin. However, in the case of a patient suffering from multiple burns, destroying both the upper and lower layers of the skin, there is not always enough healthy skin to use.

Meanwhile, other methods such as using scaffolding collagen or cultivating skin substitutes in vitro are not effective.The collagen scaffolding relies on the tissue and cells surrounding the wound to heal, while skin replacements can take weeks to prepare and are difficult to apply successfully to patients when the area is burned. big.

To overcome these challenges, the team designed a handheld device to place precursor pads directly on wounds of any size, shape or terrain. This printer uses biological ink, combined with protein fibers, stem cells along with the development of patient cells and supports the body's immune response. Printer skin directly onto the wound from the device's soft roller.

This device has been implemented by scientists since 2018. (Image: University of Toronto).

Dr Marc Jeschke, Medical Director of Ross Tilley Burn Center, Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto, co-author said: 'We designed this device either in a flat, horizontal orientation. . One of the device's most important advantages is that it will allow uniform deposition of a layer of bio-ink on inclined surfaces. '

'In this study, we tested whether the device can do this effectively by using it to treat thick burns in pigs. As a result, the device successfully prints and puts 'skin plates' on the wounds evenly, safely and reliably. The leather plates remain in place with very little movement. '

Most significantly, the results show that the wounds treated with this method have healed very well, reducing inflammation, scarring and shrinkage compared to untreated wounds and wounds treated with collagen scaffolding.

• Biological 3D printer prints skin directly onto the wound
• Video: The projector is as interactive as it is in movies