3D Printers: Present and Future

Exciting news! Researchers at Organovo are promising to be able to print entire organs for transplant patients. That technology would certainly be the jewel in the crown of the 3-D printing industry, but is Organovo living up to the hype? See for yourself:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80DhBLEhdzk

Now, plastic 3-D printing machines have been around for a few years, but I just thought this one was really cool since it’s the first of its kind to print in a few hours and in color!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ps0WEZbDjHE

And now for the crème de la crème of the future of 3D printing, nanoassemblers! “A nanoassembler is a proposed system in which nanomachines (resembling molecular assemblers, or industrial robot arms) would combine molecules to build larger atomically precise parts. These, in turn, would be assembled by positioning mechanisms of assorted sizes to build macroscopic but still atomically-precise products. A functioning nanofactory could create virtually any product at the cost of only the input raw material and energy.” Could this ever become a reality, you decide:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqyZ9bFl_qg