3D printing has excited professionals across the globe, especially in fields such as medicine – where the technology can have a profound impact on a patient’s quality of life. One company at the head of the 3D printing revolution is Oxford Performance Materials. The New Economy speaks to CEO Scott DeFelice to discuss the latest advances in the industry.

The New Economy: Now Scott, this new technology of course has evolved to the point where you can replace the human skull. Can you tell me how?

Scott DeFelice: 3D printing technology has really been around for a while. What’s new is that we can now 3D print with materials that are mechanically appropriate and biocompatible, that can be implanted in the body.

For example, this is a typical cranium implant. How someone ends up with one of these is that they may have some form of a trauma, a car accident, and they are literally missing a piece of their skull. What we’ll do is we’ll start off with a CAT scan or MRI, and then we’ll be able to design and implant that, which specifically fits that individual. This is what we ultimately put into a box and ship to a hospital.

[W]e’ll be able to design and implant that, which specifically fits that individual

The New Economy: Now how safe is it really to have one of the 3D implants live in your body versus a titanium alternative?

Scott DeFelice: The materials themselves are very safe. Their product is called PEEK or Polyether Ketone Ketone, so it is a class of polymers that are known to be safe in the human body for quite a long time. What we do in the 3D printing process is we essentially grow the parts, one layer at a time, in a very pure environment. So it’s quite a safe and effective way to produce an implant.

The New Economy: Now your company has made some great advances in terms of spinal cord long-term implantation. Can you tell me a little bit about that whole process?

Scott DeFelice: A business that we have been in for a long time is called spinal fusion. So we’ll provide a device that sits in between the vertebrae and eliminates the pain. Now with the advent of 3D printing, we can take that same material that we have been using in spinal fusion, and 3D print the device.

What that means is we can make it patient specific; that individual patient is going to get the proper anatomical fit. That means that the implant is going to eliminate pain and be more comfortable for the patient in the long term. And it’s really essentially the best clinical outcome.

The New Economy: Now wearable technology seems to be all the rage. Can you tell me how is this technology being incorporated into the healthcare sector?

Scott DeFelice: A great example of where we are heading with wearable tech is in our cranial prosthesis. So what we can do now with those implants, is we can make them smart. So we can enable them to elute a drug directly into the brain.

Ultimately we can actually chip that implant in the future, and so it can provide neurostimulation. And we even actually see a future where we can create bandwidth without other devices, for people who want to control external devices directly from the brain, because of their limited mobility.

The materials themselves are very safe

The New Economy: Can you give me an example of a condition that could be improved with such technology?

Scott DeFelice: You are quadriplegic and you want to have mobility. Clearly now people can control external mobile devices directly from your brain, but there was a problem in terms on managing that bandwidth out. And these types of devices that can stay permanently, in close proximity to your brain, will enable that.

The New Economy: Now another key sector that has benefited from some of the technology you have developed, of course is the aerospace industry. Can you tell me about some of the areas where you have been able to enhance development.

Scott DeFelice: 3D printing, what is really allows for, is to make very lightweight elegant structures. I mean it sort of emulates nature’s way of growing things; that’s the power of 3D printing or additive manufacturing. And now we can take that basic capability of the technology, and we can use a really strong lightweight material, to make structures that are really elegant and lightweight.

This means if you are making things that fly, you know you want to make them as light and strong as possible. And ultimately what that does is takes weight off aircraft, and other things that fly, and it enables one to save energy; it is about sustainability. So this is a real tool that allows companies to develop systems, aeroplanes that are better and more efficient.

The New Economy: In being able to make the process more efficient, do you think that you are able to save the aerospace industry millions of dollars potentially?

Scott DeFelice: Absolutely. We can take hundreds or thousands of pounds off aeroplanes. And when you think of the 30 to 40 year life of an aircraft, what that actually means in fuel savings – on one single aircraft is in the millions of dollars – fleets of aircrafts it’s in the billions and billions of dollars.

The New Economy: Very interesting to see how your technology is being incorporated. Thank you so much Scott.

Scott DeFelice: Thank you.