"Multi-material, multiscale" 3-D printing doesn't roll off the tongue. Help us pick a better name for the latest custom-built 3-D printers out of universities.

Chris Newmarker

The only name out there for it right now appears to be "multi-material, multiscale" 3-D printing. And Michael McAlpine at the University of Minnesota agrees it needs a better name. 

It has only been in recent years that McAlpine and researchers at other top universities have been making custom-built 3-D printers that create with multiple materials from the nanoscale to the macroscale--enabling significant medical device innovation in the process. Think printers with an XYZ platform, building with multiple nozzles delivering multiple materials, and creating computer software that enables the weaving in of the various materials to take place at the micron level.

(See McAlpine and others discuss how 3-D printing innovations are enabling the latest medtech advances at MD&M Minneapolis, September 21-22, 2016. Qmed readers get 20% off with promo code Qmed16. ) 

So what would be a snazzier name for this new 3-D printing technology? Answer our survey below:

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Chris Newmarker is senior editor of Qmed. Follow him on Twitter at @newmarker.

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