The power of 3D printing has opened up a whole new mode of “imagination engineering.” The world of tomorrow’s weapons and ammunition are going to be radically different from what we consider weapons and ammunition today.
Now that Defense Distributed has won their court case, officially legalizing 3D-printable gun uploads and downloads, how will the future respond to today’s gun laws?
Defense Distributed, the anarchist gun group known for its 3D printed and milled “ghost guns,” has settled a case with the federal government allowing it to upload technical data on nearly any commercially available firearm. Read the full story on WIRED: https://wired.trib.al/sSDiBFv
For some months now, a 3D printed house in Nantes has drawn lots of attention, not just because a printer was involved but also because it went up from start to finish so quickly (54 hours to print, then add some more time for the windows and roof). Interesting Engineering said it took some more time to add the roof, windows and doors.
A robot printer was used to print layers from the floor upwards to form the walls, and videos show a beautiful result of five rooms with rounded walls.
Now comes the latest news of the world’s first family to move into a 3D-printed home—that is now home for the Ramdani family, consisting of the two parents and their 3 children, to enjoy life in the 4-bedroom house in Nantes, France.
DENVER, July 11, 2018 /PRNewswire/ — Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) has embraced a 3D printed titanium dome for satellite fuel tanks so big you can’t even put your arms around it. The 46-inch- (1.16-meter-) diameter vessel completed final rounds of quality testing this month, ending a multi-year development program to create giant, high-pressure tanks that carry fuel on board satellites.
The titanium tank consists of three parts welded together: two 3D printed domes that serve as caps, plus a variable-length, traditionally-manufactured titanium cylinder that forms the body.
This new 3D-printed bone graft melds with your existing bone, becomes new bone, and can even grow with you. (via National Science Foundation (NSF))
Last year, I got invited to a super-deluxe private resort to deliver a keynote speech to what I assumed would be a hundred or so investment bankers. It was by far the largest fee I had ever been offered for a talk — about half my annual professor’s salary — all to deliver some insight on the subject of “the future of technology.”
I’ve never liked talking about the future. The Q&A sessions always end up more like parlor games, where I’m asked to opine on the latest technology buzzwords as if they were ticker symbols for potential investments: blockchain, 3D printing, CRISPR. The audiences are rarely interested in learning about these technologies or their potential impacts beyond the binary choice of whether or not to invest in them. But money talks, so I took the gig.
After I arrived, I was ushered into what I thought was the green room. But instead of being wired with a microphone or taken to a stage, I just sat there at a plain round table as my audience was brought to me: five super-wealthy guys — yes, all men — from the upper echelon of the hedge fund world. After a bit of small talk, I realized they had no interest in the information I had prepared about the future of technology. They had come with questions of their own.
The next phase of a NASA sponsored mission to 3D print human organs and tissues in space will launch in February 2019. A 3D BioFabrication Facility (BFF) developed by nScrypt and Techshot and destined for the International Space Station (ISS) will form part of the cargo of SpaceX CRS-17.
3D printing in zero gravity
nScrypt is based in Orlando, Florida and is a manufacturer of industrial micro-dispensing and 3D printing systems. The company is spin out of Sciperio Inc who, under a DARPA contact, developed an award winning bioprinter in 2003.
