New molecular printing technology could recreate complex chemical environments that resemble the human body

New patterning technology which could open opportunities to recreate complex biological environments has been developed by researchers at Queen Mary University of London (QMUL). '3DEAL' is a simple and inexpensive fabrication technique able to generate complex molecular patterns within soft matter, such as hydrogels, with microscale resolution and up to centimeters in depth. This capacity enables the possibility to engineer 3D hydrogel environments with spatial control of the chemical composition, opening the opportunity to recreate biological scenarios such as 3D molecular gradients or patterns. This could be used to design new drug screening platforms or build complex tissue engineered constructs....