3D printing and medicine

3D printers can make all sorts of things, from plastic viruses to circuits to houses! One of the cool new things a 3D printer can make is something you wouldn't expect, but it helps make many people's lives easier. Keep reading to find out more!

Rice University has created a 3D printer that will print a hand!

There are a lot of kids that don't have a hand or can't use their hand properly. A prosthetic hand is like a robot hand: it's made up of metal or carbon fiber, and it helps people live normally even if they don't have a hand. 

There's just one problem. Imagine that every time you grew and you had to buy bigger shoes, you also had to buy a new hand! When you're a kid and you're still growing, your prosthetic hand doesn't grow with you. The problem is that it's too expensive to buy a new hand every year, so a lot of kids don't get to use prosthetic hands. This makes life tough for them.

Thanks to the 3D printer from Rice, it's a lot cheaper to make temporary prosthetic hands! A lot of kids finally got to see what it was like to use both hands. The really cool thing is that with 3D printing, you can customize every single hand to fit each kid perfectly. That means your hand will fit just right, and it can look really cool and colorful too.

To find out more, check out this article and video:

http://news.rice.edu/2015/02/05/rice-bioengineers-use-3-d-printers-to-give-kids-a-hand/