3D printing living cells!:

https://phys.org/news/2021-11-3d-ink-cells.html

This can be a game changer if it works out.

I heard of this a few years ago when it was just beginning to be explored. The applications are boundless. Even applies to space travel, as the outside of a rocket could be living material that instantly repairs itself, if hit by a rock.

That's creepy.

Could it be used for burn victims?
Could you print a whole new face?
Bigger boobs?
A new and younger body? Essentially becoming immortal?

@Contenchess
I think genetic law says you get only X amount of cell reproduction cycles, whatever that is, so we live to be what 120 max.

But X may be bigger than that 120 if we are sneaky enough, learn enough, maybe in the NEXT 100 years.

"The average cell will divide between 50 and 70 times before cell death. As the cell divides the telomeres on the end of the chromosome get smaller. The Hayflick limit is the theoretical limit to the number of times a cell may divide until the telomere becomes so short that division is inhibited and the cell enters senescence." -Wikipedia

@Contenchess
The trick is to convince the telemeres to grow back too. I think there is work on that end of the problem but can't recall anything specific ATT.

@sonhouse said
https://phys.org/news/2021-11-3d-ink-cells.html

This can be a game changer if it works out.

One possible application:

Scan a person down to molecular level, send the file to Mars, print the person on the bio-printer, and voila! -- the person gets to Mars at the speed of light.

@bunnyknight
The tricky part is getting the one hundred trillion brain connections right.....

If that were possible...how would memory/intelligence be imparted into the new printed human?

That would be impossible I think.

@sonhouse said
@bunnyknight
The tricky part is getting the one hundred trillion brain connections right.....

That's only the more-or-less tricky part. The two really tricky parts are a. all the epi-physical properties - not so much where the connections are, but which of them are firing exactly now - and more fundamentally, b. the mere bandwidth...

@Shallow-Blue
I think such a development will not even be in century 21, MAYBE century 24 if we as a civilization still have a scientific will and development for the next 300 years.

@contenchess said
If that were possible...how would memory/intelligence be imparted into the new printed human?

That would be impossible I think.

You'd have to take a snapshot of the charge/energy state of every neural connection, assuming that memory/intelligence is actually stored there.
There was a scientist who claimed that memory/intelligence is stored somewhere else, like the quantum fabric of space, and the brain only acts like a relay; but I find that theory very hard to believe.

@bunnyknight
Especially since that theory cannot be falsified, I think anyway🙂

@sonhouse said
@Shallow-Blue
I think such a development will not even be in century 21, MAYBE century 24 if we as a civilization still have a scientific will and development for the next 300 years.

You may be right; and I suspect the sheer bandwidth needed will prove the real problem even then.

@bunnyknight said

There was a scientist who claimed that memory/intelligence is stored somewhere else, like the quantum fabric of space, and the brain only acts like a relay; but I find that theory very hard to believe.

it's called the Akashic record...all knowledge is stored in the Cosmos..