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IT鈥橲 certainly something to chew on. An 83-year-old Belgian woman is now able to eat, speak and breathe normally again after a machine printed her an entirely new jawbone 鈥� a world first. Her own jaw was destroyed by an infection called osteomyelitis but the new one, made from a fine titanium powder sculpted by a precision laser, works just as well.
The team at Biomed, the biomedical research department of the University of Hasselt in Belgium, used an MRI scan of the patient鈥檚 jawbone to get the shape right. They then fed it into a laser sintering 3D printer which fused titanium particles layer by layer until the shape of her jawbone was recreated. It was then coated in a biocompatible ceramic layer (see picture). No detail was spared: it had dimples and cavities to allow muscles to attach, and sleeves to allow nerves to pass through, plus support structures for dental implants that the woman might need in future.
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The team were astonished at the success of the 4-hour implant operation, which took place in June 2011 but was only announced this week. 鈥淪hortly after waking up from the anaesthetic the patient spoke a few words, and the day after was able to speak and swallow normally,鈥� says operation leader Jules Poukens.
Until now, probably the largest 3D-printed body part was half of a man鈥檚 upper jawbone, implanted in a 2008 operation in Finland.