Using ultrasound to 3D-print materials

Abstract

Additive manufacturing is an emerging technology that involves the progressive assembly of spatially patterned material, and it is reshaping materials fabrication. This process is becoming widely adopted for products ranging from architectural prototypes to consumer footwear (1). However, most existing methods to produce three-dimensional (3D) shapes require a raster-scanning printer (2–4) or use patterned light (5, 6) to induce material formation, which limits manufacturing to physically or optically accessible conditions. In principle, ultrasound could be used to print within centimeter-scale volumes of optically opaque media at a spatial resolution of ~100 μm. This strategy could even work inside the body. On page 1148 of this issue, Kuang et al. (7) present an ultrasoundbased volumetric printing method, showcasing fast and precise printing capabilities, and demonstrate its use for noninvasive biomaterial printing inside living tissue ex vivo.

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