3D printing human tissues for
medical, legal, and educational uses
Jacques Eric Timothy Zaneveld
Note: All models and images thereof were made by us
3D Printing -Additive Manufacturing
• 3D Printing works by depositing tiny layers of
material
• Any shape can be made on the same machine
3D printing workflow: the hard part is
getting a good computer model
Raw Data
Raw model
Remove unwanted tissue
Render in 3D
Final model
Physical model
3D printing
Example project: Medical malpractice
lawsuit
• Our client wanted an easily understood life
sized model of a patient injury.
• The patient had a spinal chord constriction
leading to him being paralyzed.
• We agreed to make models portraying the
injury.
Raw Spine data - MRI
Bone was identified by hand
The low quality data (5mm slices) lead
to a blocky model
A normal spine was fit to this data to
generate the final model
The model was cut in half,
showing the constriction
(below)
The constriction in the patient’s model
was clearly visible.
Patient spine
Healthy spine
The final print clearly shows the injury
These models are being used in an
ongoing lawsuit
Each model was printed in two parts to allow
easy viewing of both the interior and exterior.
Many designs, colors, and sizes of
objects can be constructed
We can customize everything to client specifications
Input / output possibilities
• Inputs:
– Stacks of 2D images (dicom, .png, .bmp, etc)
– Mesh files (.obj, .stl)
– Matlab files / raw voxel data (.mat, .nii)
– 3D modeling program outputs (.blend)
• Output:
– Any size within 21cm X 21cm X 22cm
– Any color (But only one color per piece)
– Resolution: better than .06mm
Ongoing projects:
• Printing patient brain lesions and tumors
• Making models of developing babies from
ultrasound data
• Making scientific equipment
Thanks!!!
Please feel free to contact me:
Jacques Eric Timothy Zaneveld
Zaneveld@bcm.edu
(541) 760-1805