"COVID-19 has helped to demonstrate the friendly relationship between engineering and medicine"

"We are in the trial phase of printing out stem cells, bones, tissue, etc. There are many applications in which digital printing can help and make medicine advance."

Almost five months ago, Alfons Miàs presented the UAB Open Labs, a new space for digital innovation open to all of the community. The Design Lab was being inaugurated at the School of Engineering, a laboratory focused on the manufacturing and construction of ideas. A few months later, with the arrival of the coronavirus outbreak, it has become one of the only spaces still open and leading a prominent role in the fight against this health crisis.

The maker community responded with solvency and now a group of volunteers keeps the 3D printers functioning more than 20 hours a day to produce the greatest amount of the healthcare material possible for hospitals and essential workers. Although the worst part of the pandemic seems to have past, they continue to be motivated and want to help the community further. Finding the necessary printing material continues to be the main difficulty and for this reason, they will soon announce through social media a crowdfunding to help them buy more materials. 

How did you come up with the initiative now taking place at the UAB Open Labs?

The maker community was highly attentive to the medical needs caused by the outbreak. In the first 10 days there was a lot of confusion until a clear line was drawn about the material the medical centres needed. The "coronavirus makers" were created and then the Medical Association of Barcelona (CoMB) and the Association of Engineers came on board in order to design the pieces that doctors needed so that we could generate a stock of items. We saw that we could make ventilators for coronavirus patients. We focused on two models and made the tubes that connect the ventilators that allow for assisted breathing. We made a series of tubular pieces. We made more than forty each week and took them to the CoMB, and they would later be taken to the Parc Taulí Hospital. We made many of those, even on Saturdays and Sundays.

Who makes up this team that is making it possible, and how do they do it?

We started out with the UAB Open Labs team. The three of us decided to work here and then we asked for volunteers to help us. Then came a team from the UAB CORES (Strategic Research Communities), formed by six people from an organisation at the Rectorat building. We also had the pleasure of incorporating Jordi Font from the Image Treatment Services and Ernesto Asensio from the Physics Department. One of them has two 3D printers and the other has one, so we had a total of five printers. The Department of Chemical, Environmental and Biological Engineering and the Area of Computer Architecture and Technology lent us two more printers, so we has a total of four printers at the UAB Open Labs and three more outside of the School of Engineering which were all printing in a coordinated manner. What is most difficult is to find the material to print with, because we had items in stock, but we rush to print for 20 or 22 hours a day and we used up the material in the first week. Getting more material has been a real adventure.

What are the main difficulties you encountered during the production process?

The campus is closed and the suppliers [were hard to find], because everyone was confined at home the first few days. We needed authorisations to enter the building, to travel to work, etc. How can you get material if everything is closed? It was difficult. Nevertheless, we received a lot of support from the University and the School of Engineering, they made everything so much easier.

Can you explain the process of the idea of designing the material to actually holding it in your hands?

You must first detect a need, which is what makers do. Ideas began to come up and we immediately used Telegram to contact doctors, nurses and people who knew the sector so they could create a list of necessities. Each day we would inspect the machines, clean them and grease them down. For each of the pieces they would bring us, we would study the most efficient and quickest way to print them out, we checked the effectiveness and quality of each piece. Sometimes it took us about a day and we'd be left without material, until we finally began to produce in more industrial amounts. We made sure all machines were producing as much as possible, while maintaining the quality, and we would rotate so that one person only came to print the pieces each day. First you remove the piece that was printed the day before, you clean it with soap and water, and dry it well before storing. All of this done with masks and globes of course. About once a week we would take them to the Parc Taulí Hospital and there they would be disinfected and prepared to be used. It's all very mechanical.

And what are you producing now?

We have finished with the ventilators, which is most of what we were printing, and now we are working on protective material for the people who must return to work. We still have one piece, which is the nasal protectors for medical teams, but we are basically making visors and glasses to protect workers in shops, nursing homes and day centres. We are coordinating this work with the Consell Comarcal del Vallès Occidental. We continue to print out material for medical teams, but we do have a lot in stock.

Has all the material produced by the UAB Open Labs been sent to the hospitals and other centres?

Yes, we took them there ourselves. Through the Telegram groups, doctors would send us pictures and thank us. The majority of middle to large towns already had people printing in 3D and they were all manufacturing products, we were just one of many more. It has been rewarding, it makes us feel like part of a team to be able to help and that we, from the UAB, have been able to contribute with our grain of sand.

Will you continue to manufacture products that are needed in the future?

The idea is to continue until there is no need for more of these products. As long as we can help in some manner, we will continue to be active; we can take turns in working. The first thing we all asked ourselves was: “Should we work Mondays to Fridays? No, we're home everyday!" We worked during spring break, holidays, weekends, etc. Each of us goes one day a week and we are happy to be able to collaborate.

What role do you think engineering can play in this fight against COVID-19?

There is a huge field to explore here, because technology is contributing enormously to the medical sector. You see it everywhere, like when you have surgery or an ultrasound. Specific digital manufacturing is helping a lot in well-known areas such as protheses, and in other lesser known areas such as surgical operations. We are in the trial phase of printing out stem cells, bones, tissue, etc. There are many applications in which digital printing can help and make medicine advance. Some things are still in an experimental phase and others are already a reality and are widely used. COVID-19 has helped to demonstrate that there is a friendly relationship between engineering and medicine, between 3D printing and medicine.