Wednesday, October 27, 2010

3D Technology on NPR on Tech Tuesday

Yesterday, Kojo Nnamde had a great one hour show on 3D Printing.    The title was:

How 3D Technology Is Changing Product Development


There were a number of very interesting speakers:

Stephen Rouse is the Director of operations and research for 3-D medical applications at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.   John Lee is a 3-D printing specialist with ABC Imaging, a printing business in Washington, D.C.   Scott Summit is an industrial engineer and co-founder of Bespoke Innovations, a firm that designs cutting-edge prosthesis.   Ashlee Vance comes on as well to discuss what he has learned about 3D printing and an article he wrote for the New York Times. Check out the links above (underlined text) to see some very cool examples of additive technology.

 One of the questions that comes up quite a bit with manufacturing is, "how do you make manufacturing cool?"     Without question, there is nothing cooler than 3D printers or additive technology.   Below is from a blog entry on the Emerging Technology Center at IMTS 2010 showing a product that was printed one layer at a time with a 3D printer or additive technology.

Don't just look at the photo below and think this is the ultimate example of 3D printing - far from it - go to the links in the first paragraph for cool examples at the individual sites listed.