Topic: 3D printing

Laura Leay interviews MIT’s Carlos Portela about a computational design framework for deformable woven metamaterials. Graphs describe the periodic architecture and how struts interweave at nodes; user-defined helix geometry controls the woven beams. The framework produces files for finite-element analysis and 3D printing, enabling predictions of large-deformation behavior and fabrication of previously inaccessible architectures. The freely available approach connects textile-inspired design with tunable elastic response.

Implantation and integration of human neural stem cells (hNSCs) to mouse host brains has been reported by previous studies. We are interested in generating a pre-organised construct from hNSCs that contains progenitors with different cerebral cortical layer identity using 3D printing technologies (Jin et al., Nat Commun 14, 5986 (2023). We optimised a sequential isolation protocol of lower and upper cortical layer specific hNSCs generated from human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs). We confirmed the ability of these cells to generate neurons of the upper or lower cortical layers both in vitro an