FEATURESTORY
by Bill Baugh
3D Printed Soil Helps Understanding
of Soil Microorganisms
S
oil scientists at Abertay University
are using 3D printing technology to
find out, for the very first time, ex-
actly what is going on in the world
beneath our feet. In the same way that ecolo-
gists study the interactions of living organ-
isms above ground, Professor Wilfred Otten
and researchers at the university’s SIMBIOS
Centre are taking advantage of the new
technology to do the same below ground.
3D printed soil is literally helping reveal the
world beneath our feet.
Using X-ray Computed Tomography (CT scan-
ning), the team have already been able to create 3D
images of the intricate structure of soil – a network of
pores not unlike the holes in cheese. However, they
now want to know how these holes, or “pore spaces”,
determine the ways in which the fungi and bacteria
living within them interact.
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And 3D printing technology has enabled the
scientists to start finding out, as they can now turn
the 3D images on the computer screen into real-life,
hand-held, 3D objects. The incredibly detailed plastic
cubes that are printed are replicas of the structure of
the soil, and are being used by the scientists as experi-
mental systems in the lab.
By inserting microorganisms, such as fungi and
bacteria, into the pore spaces within the plastic soil,
the scientists can now observe how these microorgan-
isms move through it, survive, find food sources and
interact.
Although 3D printing is becoming more common,
and people can buy 3D printers to use at home, it has
never been used to print something so intricate and
detailed as soil before. GG
Bill Baugh is a product manager for Custom Biologicals,
Inc. a manufacturer and distributor of innovative microbial
products. You can visit their website at Living-Soils.com and
he can be contacted at 561.797.3008 or Bill@Custombio.
biz.
www.GardenandGreenhouse.net
May 2018