Sounds like science fiction? How Montreal researchers are 3D printing using sound waves | 24CA News

There was a second, after many trials and errors, {that a} crew of engineering researchers at Concordia University realized they’d achieved one thing exceptional.

It might not have regarded like a lot from the skin: a number of clicks on a pc display, the whir of a 3D printer and some bubbles solidifying in a plastic dish full of liquid.

But this — at exactly 7:27 pm on April 27, 2018 — was the primary time on the planet that anybody had efficiently printed a 3D object utilizing sound waves.

“We were jumping, honestly, because we couldn’t believe that,” mentioned Muthukumaran Packirisamy, professor of engineering and director of the optical-bio microsystems lab at Concordia.

“It was a great moment for us … we had a lot of fun and parties after that!”

The crew is now celebrating as soon as once more as its analysis, revealed final April within the journal Nature Communications, is being honoured as one of many high 10 scientific discoveries of the 12 months by Québec Science journal.

It’s a expertise Packirisamy’s crew believes might be used sooner or later for every thing from repairing spacecraft and nuclear reactors, to printing medical units immediately right into a affected person’s physique.

Tiny bubbles

Direct sound printing works by way of a course of known as cavitation, defined Mohsen Habibi, a analysis affiliate on the lab.

Ultrasound waves are used to set off a sequence of tiny chemical reactions, lasting solely a matter of nanoseconds. The reactions produce immense quantities of strain and warmth, inflicting bubbles to kind within the print materials, then solidify.

“Those bubbles create polymerization basically, so they solidify the liquid resin into solid,” mentioned Habibi.

As these bubbles kind and solidify, the 3D object takes form, layer by layer, in no matter design the crew desires.

So far, they’ve printed every thing from delicate honeycomb patterns, to gears and propellers and even the outlines of human ears and noses.

High depth centered ultrasound (HIFU) has already been utilized in medical procedures to destroy tissues, reminiscent of for tumour ablations.

“This is the first time that we use this sonic chemistry of the ultrasonic waves to create things,” mentioned Packirisamy.

He mentioned sound printing can produce objects as skinny as 100 microns — in regards to the width of a human hair — and will work with quite a lot of supplies reminiscent of plastic, steel, ceramic or biomaterials.

Sound potential

While 3D printing in itself just isn’t new, Packirisamy mentioned direct sound printing affords some benefits over present applied sciences, a lot of which use lasers to govern the construct materials so the thing can take form.

“Sound can penetrate through barriers where light cannot,” mentioned Packirisamy.

This opens the potential for 3D printing an object immediately right into a hard-to-reach place, such because the engine of an airplane or beneath the pores and skin of a surgical affected person.

If a polymer or artificial tissue had been injected into the affected person’s physique, the sound printer might be used exterior the physique to kind the fabric into the mandatory form, he mentioned.

Everything from stents to — finally — artificial organs, might be printed, based on Packirisamy.

“Also we can do the repairing of inside bio-organs. That’s a future possibility,” he mentioned.

The crew examined this principle by sending ultrasound waves by way of a 15 mm layer of pig tissue. They succeeded in printing a small 3D maple leaf on the opposite aspect.

While all of it sounds slightly sci-fi, PhD scholar Shervin Foroughi mentioned theoretically it might enable sufferers to keep away from present process open surgical procedure.

“It enables surgeons to do minimally invasive surgeries and … it will reduce the recovery time for the patients,” he mentioned.

Top 10 discovery

It’s partially due to these potential societal impacts that the analysis was named one of many high 10 scientific discoveries of the 12 months by Québec Science journal.

“It’s amazing, it’s something that could have many applications in multiple industries. Obviously in hospitals, but also in aerospace and many industries,” mentioned Mélissa Guillemette, editor in chief of Québec Science journal, on CBC’s All in a Weekend.

“It’s something that had a lot of impact in the scientific community,” she mentioned. “A lot of people were amazed by this work.”

For Pakirisamy, the journal’s honours had been surprising however welcome, including that the crew now feels a renewed sense of objective to additional their work.

“It is a really defining moment for us,” he mentioned.

“It gives a new momentum and new drive for us to take the technology and apply it to society in a much more meaningful way.”