/ News
Girl, 7, gets revolutionary new 3D printed prosthetic hand that cost ONLY $50 to make
Seven-year-old Faith Lennox never thought she needed a left hand; after all, she couldn't remember losing hers when she was only 9 months old.
The 7-year-old, grabbed the replacement as soon as it came off a 3-D printer on Tuesday in Los Alamitos, California. She put it on and raced off on her bicycle.
Later, Faith happily showed off the hand to others, flexing its pink and blue fingers as she gripped her small, stuffed 'Finding Nemo' fish.
The prosthetic was constructed overnight at the Build It Workspace studio. It represents a breakthrough in small, lightweight hands that are economical and easy for children to use.
But when it came to getting one custom made in a day by a 3-D printer, that was a different story. Particularly when she got to pick the colors — her favorite pink, blue and purple, like the ones on the tank top she was wearing. It didn't hurt, either, that the appendage, called a robohand, looks a lot like the pair Marvel superhero Iron Man wears.
'It's really cool!' the otherwise shy little girl said with an exuberant grin as she stood surrounded by high-tech computers in the Build It Workspace in this Orange County suburb on Monday.
Build It Workspace is a 3-D printer studio that teaches people to use high-tech printers and provides access to them for projects. It also does commercial printing.
She had gotten out of school early to go there with her mother, Nicole, to watch in fascination as her new hand began to take shape.
She stood for several minutes transfixed as it slowly moved from computer image to hard-plastic reality.
The finished product will be the result of an emerging technology that is revolutionizing prosthetics, said Build It's Mark Lengsfeld, especially for children like Faith, who quickly outgrow expensive prosthetic limbs and have trouble even using them because of their size and weight.
'It's an amazing thing to be doing,' the company's president and founder said of making a hand that weighs less than a pound out of the same kind of plastic used in automobile parts.
Although Lengsfeld's company has printed out everything from pumps for oil and gas companies to parts for unmanned aerial vehicles, this is the first hand he and his three employees have built.
Airwolf 3D, whose printers built Faith's hand, recently cranked out 200 hands for children around the world as part of an international competition to see which company could use the most 3-D printers in one space at one time. Airwolf, with 159 printers going, won by one, said the company's creative director, Tyler Caros, who was keeping watch on Monday as the hard plastic going into Faith's hand slowly unspooled.
The oldest of three children, Faith had compartment syndrome when her position during childbirth cut off the flow of blood to her left forearm, irreparably damaging tissue, muscle and bone. After nine months of trying to save the limb, doctors determined they had to amputate just below the elbow.
Faith's parents were working with the nonprofit group E-Nable to get her a 3-D-printed hand, but the technology is so new there's a waiting list, her mother said. Then she learned of what Lengsfeld's company could do from a friend whose son visited with his Scout troop.
E-Nable provides open-source technology for building the hand, Lengsfeld said, making it economical for anyone with the right printer and a set of instructions to create one. Faith's only costs $50, and when she outgrows it she can easily build a bigger replacement.
'It's been an honor to help her,' he said.
The little girl who taught herself to swim at age 3 and surfs with her father already knows what she plans to do when she puts that new hand on.
'Ride my bike!'she said with a big grin.
Although she's already a competent rider, she noted that making turns with just one hand can be a little tricky.
Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3019151/3-D-print-technology-providing-robohand-7-year-old-girl.html
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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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