/ News
3D-nanoprinting speed record set by Vienna University
The team is able to create sculptures as small as a grain of sand in a fraction of the time than had previously been required.
To demonstrate the process the group created a model of a Formula 1 racing car 0.285mm (0.011in) in length in just over four minutes.
The scientists said the technique could be used to make small biomedical parts.
To produce the car about 100 layers, each consisting of 200 single printed lines, were created by Vienna University of Technology's equipment.
"The technology itself is quite well known in the science arena, but the problem was that it was always extremely slow," Prof Jurgen Stampfl told the BBC.
"It was good as a showcase, but for real world applications it was much too time-consuming. Making complex large 3D structures would take hours or even days.
"Using our set-up and materials, we can speed that up by a factor of 500 or in some cases 1,000 times."
Laser light
The formal name for the process is "two-photon lithography".
It involves focusing a laser beam onto liquid resin to harden it, leaving behind a line of solid polymer just a few nanometres wide.
Unlike traditional 3D-printing techniques which build up an object by adding layers to its surface, the laser can create solid material anywhere within the liquid material.
The process gets its name because the resin only sets if the molecules within it absorb two photons of the laser beam at once - which only happens at the very centre of the beam.
The team's breakthrough involved improving the control mechanism for mirrors used to focus the laser, and developing the special type of resin involved in the process.
The researchers are now developing bio-compatible resins so that the objects they create can be used by doctors.
One suggested application is to create scaffolds which cells could use to build new biological tissues.
Engineers at Washington State University have already shown how 3D-printers can be used to build scaffolds to promote the regrowth of damaged bone.
Prof Stampfl said his team's technique can work in water-based environments meaning it is also capable of creating scaffolds suitable for softer tissues such as cartilage and muscle tissue.
"We can also 'write' these structures in the presence of cells as we use an infrared laser which is completely harmless for biological tissue," he added.
"This is not possible with other 3D-printing techniques which first rely on making the scaffolds and then seed the cells, or use a thin inkjet nozzle to push through the cells which may damage them.
"The two-photon lithography technique lets us do the writing in the same space as the cells - what we call in-vivo writing."
Source: http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-17357374
/ About us
Founded by Russian entrepreneur Dmitry Itskov in February 2011 with the participation of leading Russian specialists in the field of neural interfaces, robotics, artificial organs and systems.
The main goals of the 2045 Initiative: the creation and realization of a new strategy for the development of humanity which meets global civilization challenges; the creation of optimale conditions promoting the spiritual enlightenment of humanity; and the realization of a new futuristic reality based on 5 principles: high spirituality, high culture, high ethics, high science and high technologies.
The main science mega-project of the 2045 Initiative aims to create technologies enabling the transfer of a individual’s personality to a more advanced non-biological carrier, and extending life, including to the point of immortality. We devote particular attention to enabling the fullest possible dialogue between the world’s major spiritual traditions, science and society.
A large-scale transformation of humanity, comparable to some of the major spiritual and sci-tech revolutions in history, will require a new strategy. We believe this to be necessary to overcome existing crises, which threaten our planetary habitat and the continued existence of humanity as a species. With the 2045 Initiative, we hope to realize a new strategy for humanity's development, and in so doing, create a more productive, fulfilling, and satisfying future.
The "2045" team is working towards creating an international research center where leading scientists will be engaged in research and development in the fields of anthropomorphic robotics, living systems modeling and brain and consciousness modeling with the goal of transferring one’s individual consciousness to an artificial carrier and achieving cybernetic immortality.
An annual congress "The Global Future 2045" is organized by the Initiative to give platform for discussing mankind's evolutionary strategy based on technologies of cybernetic immortality as well as the possible impact of such technologies on global society, politics and economies of the future.
Future prospects of "2045" Initiative for society
2015-2020
The emergence and widespread use of affordable android "avatars" controlled by a "brain-computer" interface. Coupled with related technologies “avatars’ will give people a number of new features: ability to work in dangerous environments, perform rescue operations, travel in extreme situations etc.
Avatar components will be used in medicine for the rehabilitation of fully or partially disabled patients giving them prosthetic limbs or recover lost senses.
2020-2025
Creation of an autonomous life-support system for the human brain linked to a robot, ‘avatar’, will save people whose body is completely worn out or irreversibly damaged. Any patient with an intact brain will be able to return to a fully functioning bodily life. Such technologies will greatly enlarge the possibility of hybrid bio-electronic devices, thus creating a new IT revolution and will make all kinds of superimpositions of electronic and biological systems possible.
2030-2035
Creation of a computer model of the brain and human consciousness with the subsequent development of means to transfer individual consciousness onto an artificial carrier. This development will profoundly change the world, it will not only give everyone the possibility of cybernetic immortality but will also create a friendly artificial intelligence, expand human capabilities and provide opportunities for ordinary people to restore or modify their own brain multiple times. The final result at this stage can be a real revolution in the understanding of human nature that will completely change the human and technical prospects for humanity.
2045
This is the time when substance-independent minds will receive new bodies with capacities far exceeding those of ordinary humans. A new era for humanity will arrive! Changes will occur in all spheres of human activity – energy generation, transportation, politics, medicine, psychology, sciences, and so on.
Today it is hard to imagine a future when bodies consisting of nanorobots will become affordable and capable of taking any form. It is also hard to imagine body holograms featuring controlled matter. One thing is clear however: humanity, for the first time in its history, will make a fully managed evolutionary transition and eventually become a new species. Moreover, prerequisites for a large-scale expansion into outer space will be created as well.
Key elements of the project in the future
• International social movement
• social network immortal.me
• charitable foundation "Global Future 2045" (Foundation 2045)
• scientific research centre "Immortality"
• business incubator
• University of "Immortality"
• annual award for contribution to the realization of the project of "Immortality”.
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