Graphics Reference
In-Depth Information
The neighborhood has been watching the FoamHome project with great interest as
the home's walls slowly grow. What was that old joke about the early days of factory
automation? “All you need these days to run a factory is a man and a dog. You need
the man to feed the dog and the dog to bite the man if he tries to touch anything.”
So far, the slowly growing house looks gorgeous, its walls curved in organic
patterns and soft curves and hollows. Nobody could build a house like this with
frame car pentr y, no matter how many people worked on the construction crew.
No one has yet seen the inside of the new home, but rumor has it that your neigh-
bor ordered designer inner walls that will look like they're made of old-fashioned
brick and mortar.
Finally you reach your ofice and catch up on the details of the inal stages of
a long investigation you've been leading for months. Your team was assigned to
investigate a new sort of black market, one that deals in replacement body parts.
More and more patients, desperate for replacement organs, are purchasing them
from uncertiied rogue bioprinting services rather than a certiied medical provider.
Bioprinting custom body parts continues to be a controversial topic in the public
mind, more polarizing even than the stem cell, abortion, or cloning debates of your
grandparents' generation.
It's gotten too easy to get replacement organs made. The cost of a high-res full
body scan has plummeted in the past few years. People like to get them in their 20s
and save the data for later, just in case if something goes wrong and they need a
quick replacement organ. Sometimes it's their joints that fail. In reality, the most
common use of “body design iles” is for cosmetic surgery, to recapture the tight
wrinkle-free skin and body of youth.
Bioprinting isn't the problem. In fact, most people believe that bioprinting is a
life-saving technology. The challenge is what to do about the growth of these new
black markets. Regulating the production of new printed body parts is dificult
since the cost of bioprinters has also plummeted. Black marketeers snap up cast-
off medical bioprinters for less than the price of a new car as last year's bioprinter
models are sold off each year by hospitals and surgical clinics.
During the investigation, you've learned that most of the time black market
organs actually work pretty well. The problems arise from faulty design iles or
sloppy organ makers who cut corners and don't use a sterile printing environment.
In a recent case a few patients died from uncertiied “vanity organs” they purchased
to improve their athletic ability and appearance. Their families are trying to igure
out who to sue: the rogue manufacturer, the bio-ink supplier, the organ designer,
or the company that certiied the design.
