The Advanced Materials and BioEngineering Research (AMBER) centre at Trinity is to collaborate with Johnson and Johnson (J&J) to build a 3-D printing laboratory. They will initially focus on research in orthopaedics, while in the long term, both Trinity and J&J will engage in staff exchanges.
The new laboratory will utilise a 100 square meter space at Trinity’s Biomedical Science Institute building, which will be equipped to suit the needs of researchers working on both bioprinting projects, as well as cellular and tissue culture.
College engineering professor and Director of the Trinity Centre for Bioengineering, Daniel Kelly, as well as J&J bioprinting senior fellow Joseph Ault will co-lead the laboratory. The facility will be open to researchers, with post-graduate and graduate students also being able to carry out work at the laboratory. J&J scientists are to provide the necessary training and education students and staff will require to work in the laboratory. This collaboration will provide a facility for both smaller individual research projects and larger long term projects which will allow for professor and staff exchange.
The collaboration with J&J keeps in line with AMBER’S ambitions to become a world leader in bioengineering and Trinity’s plans to construct a brand new Engineering, Energy and Environment (E3) Institute, as well a technology campus at Dublin’s Grand Canal Dock. This new campus is aiming to act as a location for entrepreneurial partnership, whilst providing a significant expansion in college research and innovation activities.
Speaking after the announcement on the collaboration, AMBER Director Michael Morris, said: “Building on our long-standing collaboration with DePuy Synthes in Ireland, I am confident that this engagement will become the prototypical strategic partnership for AMBER as the Centre moves into the next funding cycle.”
The laboratory is expected to begin construction in the first quarter of 2018, with completion expected by the end of the year. Funded by the Science Foundation Ireland, AMBER operates a national science institute, with its headquarters located on campus at Trinity.
