Space system manufacturerRedwirehas unveiled plans to launch a new and improved version of its 3D bioprinter to theNASAInternational Space Station(ISS).
Specifically, working with theUniformed Services Universityof the Health Sciences Center for Biotechnology (4DBio3), Redwire aims to send up an upgraded edition of itsBioFabrication Facility(BFF). Once there, the system’s human cell deposition capabilities will be utilized to investigate the potential of 3D bioprinting in helping treat the meniscal injuries often suffered by US military service personnel.
“BFF is game-changing technology that could have significant implications for the future of human health and patient care on Earth,” said Redwire Executive Vice President of In-Space Manufacturing and Operations, John Vellinger. “The ISS provides a critical testing platform to advance these cutting-edge technologies that are enabling critical investigations from commercial users and the scientific research community that will one day extend to future commercial space stations.”
Redwire’s 3D printing activities
Over the last 18 months, Redwire has made a series of acquisitions that have established it as a major player in the orbital systems space. Having bought aerospace manufacturers Adcole Space and Deep Space Systems in June 2021, the company went on to purchaseMade In Space, a firm known for its microgravity 3D printing expertise.
Made In Space’sArchinaut low-gravity 3D printingtechnology has previously been used to realize advanced builds such as asatellite-mounted ‘virtual telescope’,与深空观测的应用程序。在past, the firm has also worked withBraskemto develop the ‘Braskem Recycler,’ a system designed to recycle defunct parts onboard the ISS.
Since then,Redwire’s $615 million SPAC mergerhas seen it go public and raise the funding needed to continue its expansion into the commercial space and experimental bioprinting industries. Last year, the company launched its ISS Redwire Regolith Print study, in which it’s seeking to determine thefeasibility of 3D printing regolithinto lunar structures.
As well as studies on the ISS, Redwire is now set to engage in3D bioprinting on the ‘Orbital Reef,’a commercial space station project being led byBlue OriginandSierra Space. Using some of the cash generated via its SPAC IPO, the company has alsobought microgravity printing firm Techshot, in a move that CEO Peter Cannito described when it was completed as a “natural fit with its 3D printing strategy.”
The BFF gets a new mission
Together, Redwire’s BFF and ADvanced Space Experiment Processor (ADSEP), make up the first system to ever be capable of manufacturing human tissues in the microgravity conditions of space. By precisely placing adult pluripotent stem cells, the system is able to create ultra-fine layers of bioink that are several times smaller than the width of a human hair, which can be built up into viable structures.
Critically, to prevent tissues collapsing, the BFF now features a Redwire-developed cell-culturing system that strengthens them over time, to the point that they’re self-supporting under gravity, in a process that can take anything from 12 to 45 days.
With further R&D, Redwire believes this technology can be honed to address the shortage of organ donors for transplant patients. Essentially, by 3D printing patient-specific implants, the firm anticipates being able to cancel out any risk to future donors, while drastically reducing any chance of patient organ rejection.
Although such advances remain years from realization, the BFF is currently capable of printing and culturing organoids with drug R&D, disease modeling and tissue engineering applications. With the latest version of the machine, Redwire aims to put these capabilities to practical use, by bioprinting a knee meniscus with military treatment potential, which will then be studied and sent back to Earth.
The firm’s upgraded 3D bioprinter is set to be launched with three other payloads onNorthrop Grumman’s18th cargo resupply services mission (NG-18) to the ISS no earlier than November 6, 2022, from Spaceport Pad 0A on Wallops Island, Virginia.
Microgravity 3D printing advances
The ISS has become something of a hotbed for 3D printing R&D in recent years, with both commercial and academic researchers seeking to test emerging technologies under microgravity conditions. Earlier this year,AddUprevealed that it hadlaunched a metal 3D printing demonstrator to the ISS, which it helped develop as part of theEuropean Space Agency’s(ESA’s) wider ‘Metal3D’ project.
In 3D bioprinting,CELLINKpartnered with what was Made in Space (and is now Redwire) back in 2019, to identifypotential orbital bioprinting opportunitiesonboard the ISS. When first initiated, it was thought the program could have a profound impact on the drug screening and cancer research carried out on terra firma.
In a more recent study,Iowa State Universityresearcherstested a zero-gravity electronics 3D printeraboard a refitted airplane. By continually flying the plane up and down at 45º angles, the team found they were able (at the top of this curve), to conduct tests while experiencing short bouts of weightlessness (and sickliness) in microgravity.
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Featured image shows the International Space Station. Photo via NASA.
