Recently, 3D printing technology is wildly used in many area not only chemical but also pharmaceutical.
Here is a nice review for 3D printing applications.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41570-018-0058-y
I know only a little bit about the application of 3D printing for pharmaceutical company, for example micro reactor or labo on tip. Also Cronin group published exciting articles about AI and 3D printing.
In the article, authors reviews many examples. One is a laboratory equipments. By using 3D printer, researcher can design their own custom equipment with low cost. I really amazed that 3D printing used for making NMR tube and it could be used for reaction monitoring! Wow!!!
https://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlelanding/2017/nj/c6nj03614g#!divAbstract
Second my interest was micro fluidics and milli fluidics. Making chemical reactor is interesting for me because I love organic synthesis! Fig3 in the article shows some examples of chemical reactors. Fig3-c is multi component reactor for synthesis of baclofen. And Fig3-d is flow reactor, the reactor used for a difluoromethylation reaction with n-BuLi at -65deg.
It is interesting for me that 3D printed reactor is compatible for organic reaction. And the 3D printing technology can provide catalytically active surfaces by modifying the chemical composition of the print material. The article describes some examples of catalytic reaction with the device.
Third my interest was drug delivery.
Fig8 shows some examples of API(Drug) printing for controlling drug release rates.
The technology is growing very rapidly and I would like to use the technology in my own research project in the future.
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