L’Oreal Teaming Up To 3D Print Skin

Cause you’re worth it. The catch phrase of L’Oreal, a world-famous cosmetic company, is known to many. Did you know that they grow skin from donated samples? How about that they want to start 3D printing human skin?

Teaming up with the start-up company Organovo, L’Oreal hopes to be able to use the created skin in its product tests. Organovo, however, is new to this area, having already claimed that they can 3D print a human liver that will last for up to 40 days.

Stated as in the early research stages, experts are divided about how this would work. Many believe that the science behind it is plausible, and that is is possible to 3D print skin and other parts using human cells. One possible application of this would be to help burn and trauma patients, being able to replace the damaged skin and create skin graphs on site in each hospital using specialist 3D printers.

A major advantage of this would be in regards to animal testing, with the ability to test cosmetics on human tissue giving better results and more in-depth knowledge about side effects without the need for animal testing or damage to a person undergoing the testing.

With the ability to create more humane testing methods, help repair damage done by fire to burn victims and with untold potential it will be interesting to follow how L’Oreal and Organovo use this technology and research.

Thank you BBC and Organovo for providing us with this information.