Presurgical Planning Models

Our lab develops methods to print physical models that mimic the geometries and mechanical properties of real human tissue. Through automated design and materials research, we are developing 3D printed training and patient-specific presurgical planning platforms. The models generated from our work will be used to bring accurate, print-on-demand training/planning platforms to surgeons, medics and students.

3D Printed Materials that Feel and Respond Like Real Human Tissue

This research was derived from previous multi-material work and software development. Our lab’s paper published in Advanced Materials (DOI:10.1002/adma.202308491) outlined a method to print tunable materials that mimic human tissues, ranging from stiff tendons and bones to soft gray matter, all within a single print. Publications in 3D Printing and Additive Manufacturing (DOI:10.1089/3dp.2022.0265) and Journal of Visualized Experiments (DOI:10.3791/63214) demonstrated the ability to input patient scan data and print accurate models at the voxel-level.

An Automated, Accurate, Efficient Platform to Print Patient-Specific Models

Current 3D printed presurgical planning methods take multiple software platforms and hours of refinement to generate a single model that does not mechanically represent human tissues. Our research pairs our materials research with software development, in which we utilize OpenVCAD (DOI:10.1016/J.ADDMA.2023.103912) to input patient scan data and assign custom mechanical properties to them. This method generates patient-specific, mechanically accurate models for presurgical planning in minutes. Doctors, medics, and nurses use these models for training and surgery preparation.

Generating Hard-to-Scan Human Vascular Structures

Medical scans cannot measure all human tissues, particularly fine vascular structures. We develop methods to automatically generate these structures within bounding volumes, and they can be tuned based on human tissue type and desired vessel size. Combining geometrical and mechanical representations of blood vessels, we generate printed human vascular simulants that can be cut, bled, and injected.