Above: Parts made using the new resin/Image Credit: Copper3D
Copper3D, a Chilean-North American company, a pioneer in antimicrobial materials for the 3D printing industry, begins this 2021 with interesting news and launches. Since its founding in 2018 Copper3D has had a meteoric journey, full of achievements, including having built a network of 20 distributors worldwide, with sales in more than 50 countries.
They have been awarded two NASA research funds, recognised within the world Top 5 of companies that are impacting the 3D printing materials sector, even being mentioned in the prestigious World Economic Forum. Furthermore, this innovative company recently validated at the Pasteur Institute of France that the antimicrobial additives (Cuprionix®) used in all its products are antiviral and effectively eliminate 90% of Human Coronavirus in 5 minutes and + 99.975% in 60 minutes, which is quite a discovery and a powerful endorsement of the technology developed by this company.
Glaciarys AR3®, the new innovation of Copper3D
Although Copper3D began its journey as a pioneer in antimicrobial materials for FDM technology, it soon turned its focus to SLA technology, due to the high quality that can be obtained with this type of printing and the great potential for disruption that could have this technology combined with their antimicrobial additive developments.
Daniel Martínez, Director of Innovation at Copper3D comments: “Our vision has always been on how copper-based antimicrobial technology can have the greatest impact on preventing infections and saving lives, hopefully with solutions on a global scale. 3D printing is a tremendously versatile technology to rapidly prototype, validate and manufacture all kinds of solutions ranging from antimicrobial insoles for patients with the diabetic foot to surgical guides for complex surgeries, through a very interesting range of applications that can also be developed by a range of people from makers at home or FabLabs to more professional teams in hospitals or clinics.
The new Glaciarys AR3® resin that we are about to launch response directly to very specific requests from some surgeons and dentists who asked us for a high-performance antimicrobial material that could be used safely in surgical conditions. This is how we thought of a solution beyond FDM technology and focused on SLA due to its high-quality characteristics, excellent resolution, and the ability to prototype different formulations of resins and concentrations of additives that resulted in an “all-terrain” resin, with an accessible price, but at the same time, ideal for this type of request in the field of biomedical 3D printing”.
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In this regard, Dr. Claudio Soto, Medical Director of Copper3D mentions: “The development we have had as a company, always focusing on the correct validation and certification of our materials, has allowed that today we have many professionals in the Healthcare sector interested in our developments, and have also shown great confidence in the quality and safety of all our products. As a company we have also been able to adapt quickly to the demands of the industry, where the formulation and generation of new products advance in parallel with laboratory validations, avoiding unnecessary delays and speeding up the certification processes.
Regarding this new development in the field of SLA 3D printing, we want to thank Dr. Felipe Reinares, a prestigious orthopedic shoulder and elbow surgeon, very innovative in his field and always open to supporting new developments and using new technologies early.
Together with Dr. Reinares and his team we were able to test this new resin to design and print a surgical guide that he used for a complex shoulder arthroplasty surgery, having passed all the pre-surgical processes (hydrogen peroxide plasma sterilization, Sterrad) and with an impeccable surgical performance, which allowed this surgery to be a success. This validates that Glaciarys AR3® is an ideal resin for this type of applications, and for many others in fields such as dentistry, orthopedics, rehabilitation, among others”.
Above: Surgical guides 3D printed using new resin/Image Credit: Copper3D
It should also be noted that this resin is biocompatible and has already been subjected to ISO22196 tests with excellent results, demonstrating its effectiveness against Escherichia coli (99.4% elimination at 6 hours and 100% elimination at 24 hours) and against Staphylococcus aureus (94.47% elimination at 6 hours and 99.99% elimination at 24 hours).
