3D Printing: The Future is Now

Kae Woei is the founder of XYZWorkshop, a little creative Melbourne studio formed in early 2013 with his wife Elena Low. XYZ Workshop became a creative outlet for Kae Woei and Elena from their day-to-day jobs, both practising Architects at the time. Much like architecture, they were drawn into the potential of 3D printing as it fused aspects of art, sculpture and technology.

Their creative explorations were fuelled by the desire to experiment and play with additive manufacturing. leading them to create some special pieces, most notably the InBloom dress; one of the first fully 3D printed flexible dresses that was entirely printed on a domestic desktop 3D printer.

The inBloom dress has been featured ont the Discovery Channel and also made an appearance at the White House, when former first lady Michelle Obama hosted an event for fashion education. Kae Woei now continues his work in 3D printing with Imaginables Pty Ltd by consulting companies and education institutions as well as providing schools with resources for activity-based learning.

Dr Zhe Li is currently working at Burns Unit Concord Hospital. He studied medicine and also has a PhD research degree from University of Sydney. Through years of medical and scientific trainings, he has developed his expertise knowledge and skills in cell biology, skin tissue engineering and regenerative medicine; cell/tissue therapy and living skin substitute for severe burn wound healing. Since 2003 he has been leading the clinical laboratory service to cultivate living skin autografts for severe burn patients in all burn centers under NSW Statewide Severe Burns Services.

Dr Li is a faculty member of Sydney Medical School in the discipline of surgery; the head scientist of Concord Hospital Skin Laboratory, a GMP facility for cellular therapy for NSW state-wide burns service and a principle researcher of Burns and Reconstructive Surgery Research at Concord Hospital. He was a 2008 Churchill Fellow of Australia and a finalist of 2012 Pride of Australia Award. He services as the editorial board member of several international scientific journals. He is also a visiting professor of two Medical Universities in China. Dr Li will talk about the applications and potential impact of 3D printing in different fields of future medicine.

Melissa Fuller is an energetic entrepreneur and a motivated activist, inspired by principles of the next industrial revolution. A catalyst for a new economy, her focus is on the intersection of design and manufacturing, and how open design commons and local production can create greater equality in society. Her career path has seen her start or join initiatives that contribute to a sustainable and ethical future. Melissa is the Social Impact co-ordinator at UNSW Michael Crouch Innovation Centre and has co-founded four socially progressive organisations including ThreeFarm Network, MakersPlace Inc, MateriaAustralia and AbilityMate being her most significant impact to date.

Huw holds a Bachelor of Mechanical Engineering (Mechatronic, Hons, 2003-2008) from the University of New South Wales and has been employed at ide for the last 10 years. He is a senior product developer and mechatronic specialist, mainly responsible for technical development and technical leadership and mentoring on projects at ide with a keen focus on medical devices. Throughout Huw’s time at ide he has been a core team member involved with developing innovative and disruptive medical devices and technologies from high volume diagnostics devices to low volume custom complex mechanical systems for small local start-ups to large foreign multinational corporations.

Huw has also led technical development and systems engineering for large, complex multidisciplinary teams and holds a number of patent and design registrations. Huw has experience in setup of local and foreign manufacturing systems; from manual low volume assembly to complex automated/semi-automated high volume assembly. He has been responsible for setup, management and auditing of manufacturing facilities and is experienced in many different manufacturing processes, including evaluation, assessment and management of suppliers locally and internationally.

Huw has also developed and implemented company-wide procedures to attain ISO9001 & ISO13485 Quality Management System accreditation, and is actively involved with continuous process improvement and auditing. In 2014 Huw was named Qmed worldwide top 30 under 30 most promising engineers and designers for the medical device industry. Other achievements include winner of three Engineering Excellence Award including the prestigious Bradfield Award for Engineering Excellence, Medical Design Excellence Awards as Best in Show, and the winner of the In Vitro Diagnostics Category and Sydney Design Awards Gold Winner. Huw was previously involved with the design, manufacture and servicing of custom made veterinary and human anaesthetic machines and critical care products for an Australian local business.

Dagmar Reinhardt is an architect, robotics research leader and program director of the BAE (Bachelor of Architetcure and Environments) at the School of Architecture, Design and Planning, The University of Sydney. Reinhardt has recently chaired the ROB|ARCH2016 Robots in Architecture, Art and Design conference that brought international researchers, industry and practice to Australia. Reinhardt's architecture practice reinhardtjung produces building projects, installations, curatorial work, research, publications, lectures and exhibitions in Europe and Australia, has been widely published, and received numerous awards.

Reinhardt’s work extends architectural performance and performativity towards design research and cross-disciplinary practice with audio-acoustics, and structural engineering, with a focus on engineering the acoustic behaviour of curved geometries through generative design and robotic fabrication, and in choreographing relationships between kinect sensing, fabricated materiality, and body movement. Her work with biome explores the mathematical language shared between scripting, sound/music, digital fabrication, interaction design and architecture.