Making data matter

May 31, 2018

A multimaterial, voxel-printing method turns imaging datasets into physical objects

By Lindsay Brownell

(CAMBRIDGE, Mass.) — The world is awash in digital images, from photographs to x-rays to computer models to 3D scans. The advent of 3D printing has made it possible to take imaging data and print it into physical representations, but the process of doing so has been prohibitively time-intensive and costly.

A new data processing method developed through a joint collaboration between the Wyss Institute and the MIT Media Lab removes that roadblock by converting various different forms of complex 3D data into a stack of high resolution “dithered bitmaps” which preserves extremely fine details and material gradients present in the source files. The researchers hope that this “bridging of the gap between digital information representation and physical material composition” will help democratize 3D printing and eventually allow anyone to print an accurate, detailed, full-color 3D model of almost anything imaginable.

Here is a selection of the physical objects their method created from various imaging datasets, featured in a second publication in Science Advances.

Making data matter — 1/5 The 291,362 colored line segments in this 3D-printed model of a human brain represent bundles of axons that connect different regions of the brain, color-coded based on their orientation in 3D space. Credit: The Mediated Matter Group / MIT Media Lab

PUBLICATION: Science Advances - Making data matter: Voxel printing for the digital fabrication of data across scales and domains

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PRESS CONTACT

Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University
Lindsay Brownell, lindsay.brownell@wyss.harvard.edu, +1 617-432-8266

MULTIMEDIA CONTACT

Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University
Seth Kroll, seth.kroll@wyss.harvard.edu, +1 617-432-7758

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The Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University (http://wyss.harvard.edu) uses Nature’s design principles to develop bioinspired materials and devices that will transform medicine and create a more sustainable world. Wyss researchers are developing innovative new engineering solutions for healthcare, energy, architecture, robotics, and manufacturing that are translated into commercial products and therapies through collaborations with clinical investigators, corporate alliances, and formation of new startups. The Wyss Institute creates transformative technological breakthroughs by engaging in high risk research, and crosses disciplinary and institutional barriers, working as an alliance that includes Harvard’s Schools of Medicine, Engineering, Arts & Sciences and Design, and in partnership with Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston Children’s Hospital, Dana–Farber Cancer Institute, Massachusetts General Hospital, the University of Massachusetts Medical School, Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, Boston University, Tufts University, Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, University of Zurich and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The MIT Media Lab (http://media.mit.edu) transcends known boundaries and disciplines by actively promoting a unique, antidisciplinary culture that emboldens unconventional mixing and matching of seemingly disparate research areas. The Lab creates disruptive technologies that happen at the edges, pioneering such areas as wearable computing, tangible interfaces, and affective computing. Today, faculty members, research staff, and students at the Lab work in over 25 research groups and initiatives on more than 450 projects that range from digital approaches for treating neurological disorders, to advanced imaging technologies that can “see around a corner,” to the world’s first “smart” powered ankle-foot prosthesis. Lab researchers are committed to delving into the questions not yet asked, whose answers could radically improve the way people live, learn, express themselves, work, and play.