导读：从打造工艺复杂的吉他到制作美味可口的巧克力，3D打印技术的不断发展使其应用范围逐步扩大。日前，英国格拉斯哥大学的研究人员宣布了一项更为惊人的研究成果——人们可以用3D打印技术在自己家中制造药品。这个令人难以置信的颠覆性理论或许能挽救数百万人的生命。
据美国媒体4月18日的消息，从打造工艺复杂的吉他到制作美味可口的巧克力，3D打印技术的不断发展使其应用范围逐步扩大。日前，英国格拉斯哥大学的研究人员宣布了一项更为惊人的研究成果——人们可以用3D打印技术在自己家中制造药品。这个令人难以置信的颠覆性理论或许能挽救数百万人的生命。
格拉斯哥大学的李•克罗宁教授和他的研究团队对一台3D打印机进行改良，在其中加入装有化学药品的容器。经过改造，3D打印机相当于拥有了一个小型“反应件”，可以合成用户所需药品。通常，这种“反应件”只存在于大型化工设备之中。
此项创新将大大降低药品制作成本，使更多的癌症患者能够接受到之前所负担不起的昂贵治疗。此外，该技术还能使医生更为精确地对症下药，甚至能够让患者在家中自制药品。
克罗宁教授指出：“3D打印机能够革新发展中国家的医疗保健方式，能够使病情诊断和治疗更为高效和经济实用。”
目前，此项研究成果的论文已经发表在英国《自然•化学》杂志上。
3D打印技术又称三维打印技术，是指通过可以“打印”出真实3D物体的设备，与激光成型技术一样，采用分层加工、迭加成形，即通过逐层增加材料来生成3D实体。3D打印技术与传统的去除材料加工技术完全不同并具有十分广泛的应用范围。
Integrated 3D-printed reactionware for chemical synthesis and analysis
Mark D. Symes, Philip J. Kitson, Jun Yan, Craig J. Richmond, Geoffrey J. T. Cooper, Richard W. Bowman, Turlif Vilbrandt & Leroy Cronin
Three-dimensional (3D) printing has the potential to transform science and technology by creating bespoke, low-cost appliances that previously required dedicated facilities to make. An attractive, but unexplored, application is to use a 3D printer to initiate chemical reactions by printing the reagents directly into a 3D reactionware matrix, and so put reactionware design, construction and operation under digital control. Here, using a low-cost 3D printer and open-source design software we produced reactionware for organic and inorganic synthesis, which included printed-in catalysts and other architectures with printed-in components for electrochemical and spectroscopic analysis. This enabled reactions to be monitored in situ so that different reactionware architectures could be screened for their efficacy for a given process, with a digital feedback mechanism for device optimization. Furthermore, solely by modifying reactionware architecture, reaction outcomes can be altered. Taken together, this approach constitutes a relatively cheap, automated and reconfigurable chemical discovery platform that makes techniques from chemical engineering accessible to typical synthetic laboratories.
文献链接：https://www.nature.com/nchem/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nchem.1313.html#/affil-auth
