Wanderers<\/a>: An Astrobiological Exploration, part of \u201cThe Sixth Element\u201d design collection curated by Stratasys for Euromold 2014. With four pieces of Oxman\u2019s artwork, the Wanderers series is an ongoing collaboration between Stratasys and Oxman, as well as members of the Mediated Matter research group, the Laboratory of Prof. Pamela Silver at Harvard Medical School, and Deskriptiv (Christopher Bader & Dominik Kolb).<\/p>\nThe Wanderers series speculates about the possibility of voyaging beyond planet Earth to other planets. Each of the wearables in the series is designed to contain and generate life-sustaining elements. Mushtari, meaning huge or giant in Arabic, evoking the planet Jupiter, was designed as a single strand filled with living matter. An organ system for consuming and digesting biomass, absorbing nutrients and expelling waste, the 3D printed translucent tract was designed to support the flow of cyanobacteria engineered to convert sunlight into sucrose presenting the prospects of sustaining living organisms inside a wearable.<\/p>\n
The Stratasys 3D printed piece for Oxman\u2019s creation and TED Talk continued this idea and saw Mushtari function for the very first time as a vessel to support, control and manipulate living organisms inside a wearable device.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the end, it is clear that the incorporation of synthetic biology in 3D printed products for wearable microbiomes will enable the transition from designs that are inspired by Nature, to designs made with and by Nature, to, possibly designing Nature herself,\u201d Oxman said in reference to future endeavors.<\/p>\n
Part of a range of similar wearables that make up Professor Oxman’s series entitled “Wanderers: An Astrobiological Exploration,” Mushtari (meaning huge in Arabic, and a reference to the planet Jupiter) has been produced using a Stratasys Objet500 Connex3 3D production system with triple-jetting to create a large fluid network whose inner channel diameters range from 1 mm to 25 mm and vary from opaque to clear. The clear sections are designed to promote photosynthesis in the cyanobacteria the wearable is designed to contain.<\/p>\n
“This (3D printing) enabled varying levels of transparency and translucency to be designed into surface areas where photosynthesis was desired,\u201d said Professor Oxman, speaking at the 2015 TED conference in Vancouver, Canada. “Channels and pockets were implemented to enhance the flow and functionality of the cells \u2013 such mechanical and optical property gradation can only be achieved using multi-material 3D printing with high spatial resolution for manufacturing.”<\/p>\n
Providing substance to the possibility of traveling to other worlds, all of the wearables in Oxman\u2019s “Wanderers” series are intended to be self-sustaining, contained elements that support life \u2013 rather like living spacesuits \u2013 on planets that do not have an atmosphere like the Earth’s. Mushtari, in this case, was conceived as an organ system used to ingest biomass, absorb nutrients, and then eject waste products. As such, the translucent 3D-printed channels are envisioned to encourage the movement of cyanobacteria through the system and convert sunlight to sucrose for the consumption of the human attached to the wearable.<\/p>\n
“This is the first time that 3D printing technology has been used to produce a photosynthetic wearable piece with hollow internal channels designed to house microorganisms,” said Professor Oxman. “Inspired by the human gastrointestinal tract, Mushtari hosts synthetic microorganisms \u2013 a co-culture of photosynthetic cyanobacteria and E. coli bacteria \u2013 that can fluoresce bright colors in darkness and produce sugar or biofuels when exposed to the sun. Such functions will in the near future augment the wearer by scanning our skins, repairing damaged tissue and sustaining our bodies, an experiment that has never been attempted before.”<\/p>\n
Synthetic technology that emulates human organs is fast becoming a viable and largely preferable alternative for research and experimentation, without the need to source, store, and dispose of real human tissue.<\/p>\n
Similarly, wearables such as Mushtari may also represent a method to incorporate and contain living organisms in close proximity to the skin in a symbiotic relationship that may be ideal for the rigors of long space voyages and the surfaces of hostile planets. A living, self-sustaining cocoon that recycles waste and provides energy from an external source would be far preferable to a spacesuit that simply provides support based on the amount of consumables you can conceivably carry.<\/p>\n
Given the complexity of printing channels of varying thickness and transparency, Stratasys had to develop a new bespoke way to produce Mushtari. This, according to the creative director of art fashion design at Stratasys, Naomi Kaempfer, is one of the reasons that this particular element is so innovative:<\/p>\n
“We have a fertile research collaboration with Professor Neri Oxman, one that has great reciprocal benefits as we push each other to the edges of expression and technological capability,” said Kaempfer. “3D printing Mushtari is a wonderful example of how far this collaboration can bring us. Our R&D team went beyond the boundaries of our existing technology, formulating a dedicated improved support structure to allow a smooth, effective process in support of Professor Oxman\u2019s vision.”<\/p>\n
As another part of “The Sixth Element” design collection of the “Wanderers” series in an ongoing collaboration between Stratasys and Oxman, members of the Mediated Matter research group, the Laboratory of Professor Pamela Silver at Harvard Medical School, and the graphic design company, Deskriptiv, Mushtari is by far the most ambitious and technically difficult wearable so far produced. This effort, however, has resulted in a new system that potentially begins to blur the line between synthetic and biological structures and points toward a much more biologically-oriented technological future of wearable devices.<\/p>\n
“In the end, it is clear that the incorporation of synthetic biology in 3D-printed products for wearable microbiomes will enable the transition from designs that are inspired by nature, to designs made with and by nature, to, possibly designing nature herself,” said Professor Oxman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Architect, designer and long-term 3D printing collaborator Prof. Neri Oxman has revealed the world\u2019s first 3D printed photosynthetic wearable, embedded with living matter, on the TED2015 stage in Vancouver. Oxman unveiled Mushtari, an artwork 3D printed by Stratasys and the world\u2019s first wearable to combine multi-material additive manufacturing and synthetic biology. \u201cThis is the first […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","nova_meta_subtitle":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5572],"tags":[],"supplier":[8620,10079,6258,10080],"class_list":["post-26541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bio-based","supplier-euromold","supplier-neri-oxman","supplier-stratasys-ltd","supplier-ted2015"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26541\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26541"},{"taxonomy":"supplier","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/renewable-carbon.eu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/supplier?post=26541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}