Have you heard of Nat.Net? It seems like you probably should have – or, at least, I should have – by now. This is because Nat.Net is a company that claims to have reached the Holy Grail of 3D printing. They claim to be able to print anything, at all, ever, pretty much. But, they are extremely vague about it. So, when they perform their big unveiling at the Frontiers of Interaction Conference (at the unique, Frank Gehry-esque MiCo building) in Milan, hopefully they become a little less vague about it or else they’ve got some ‘splainin’ to do. Until then, and we will follow up, we will have to decipher their promotional materials and an e-mail they sent to 3DPI. Here’s a video from their website:
Join the Nat.Net Beta Community from Nat Net on Vimeo.
The premise is that, using a 3D molecular printer, you will be able to input all of the right chemical elements and get out whatever you want. This seems to be the idea that lies at the heart of all of the 3D printing hype, possible and impossible at the same time. Possible in that it is logically possible, given the right know-how and technology. Impossible in that, as far as I know, we currently lack the right know-how and technology. According to a message we received from one of their team members, they’re well on their way to accomplishing this feat:
We use a new technology able to print objects combining pure chemical elements. Our system of recipes allow us to generate a list with all the elements needed to print the desired object.
In this way, everything becomes a digital file entirely open-source.
Our system grants you the possibility to manage molecules to reassemble them during the printing process, to obtain the shapes and the features desired. Organic or inorganic, it’s up to you.
Alessio Laschi and Andrea Terzi met at NANOCON 2011 in Brno and since then worked to bring 3Dprint to a higher level. They found other great people who joined the project, and together we develop a software, thanks to the team’s know-how about maker’s world and nanotechnology, capable of creating and managing these new kind of recipes but also a network ready to work following the logics of freesoftware and p2p.
We think this is the right way to share knowledge today. To cooperate between science and design to generate solid work-models for the future.
I tried to contact them for more detailed information, but haven’t heard back yet. If their unveiling puts some proof in the pudding, you’ll bet that you’ll hear A LOT more about it. For now, all we have is some clever marketing, such as their Thingiverse page, where the group has uploaded the .stl for a pear, as well as a file with a previously unheard of format called .3dnp, which I think probably stands for “3D nanoparticle”. The description underneath their pear is this: “First model that we design as a Network in this BETA Period. In order to add the organic material, you need this 3dnp file for your molecular printer: http://www.natnet.it/pear_natnet.3dnp“
Do they have the know-how and the tech to pull off the impossible? The cynic in me says that it’s unlikely and part of an ad campaign to seek funding to establish a Modern Meadows type company, but the kid in me is holding out for a device that would completely alter the world as we know it. If it’s real, one Thingiverse user who commented on the Nat.Net pear could have his dreams come true:
All they want is attention and you’re giving it to them.
Another company promising “gruszki na wierzbie” (polish saying meaning completely ridiculous and impossible to achieve things, direct translation: pears on trees). botObjects was building similar hype around their First Multi Color 3D Printer… http://solidsmack.com/cad-design-news/botobjects-release-first-video-of-multi-color-3d-printer-in-action/ If it was true they would show us some tasty results… 🙂 I really want to believe them – but first impressions are so typical for another “marketing gimmick”.
Agreedo. They are opening a store in Florence, I guess, and have some cool renderings of their “molecular printer”. https://www.facebook.com/wearenat?fref=ts
Here’s to ending all of the world’s problems (and the world itself) with one machine!
Well – it is possible but highly unlikely that they could pull that stunt off without having ANYONE ever heard about it and leaked it somewhere. Ey even Apple can’t do that kind of thing 🙂 I want to believe, but based on my current knowledge of the 3dP Scene i’d say: it’s a movie promo
The single most noteworthy trend for 3D printing insiders over the past year: whether makers high in prestige in RepRap circles, experienced specialist media commentators, marketeers for the ‘good old’ additive manufacturing giants, tepid toe touching of warm waters by experienced technology corporation interests: ‘I’ll believe it when I see it.’
As hype defines the newcomers, counter-hype has defined the inner circles. Almost every time, the inner circles have made the error of judgement: counter-hype has defied the inner circles.
Why? Cultural differentiation – if industry insiders and specialists were just normally saying the same things as new comers, they wouldn’t have much of a specialism.
Regarding Nat.Net: I don’t think this is impossible. I don’t even think this implausible.
When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. The elimination of the impossible in this case is that this case is impossible.
Time scale of rate of change of progress of technology is the one thing that most technology experts get wrong, almost every time.
There is no transcendence of physical, chemical and biological rules in the proposition put forward by Nat.Net. No real great leap of faith.
Empirical minds lack faith. Faith can be rational. Faith in the probability of given solutions being found: Where there is a need humans succeed. Humans fundamentally need to address the sustainability of sustenance problem. That the potential is there for this solution by these technologies, that the need is there to create the solution, creates a canvass of possibility – which increases probability.
In terms of probablistics, do we have the capacity for this technology now? Yes. Would it require fairly significant funding? More likely than not. If we don’t see it from a low-funded project like Nat.Net, we’ll see it via DARPA, NASA, ESA or Singularity University -backed projects within 3 years.
Go beat them to it…?