Awardee: Rebecca Pollet and Colin Echeverría Aitken
Semester of Award: 2024-2025
Materials Awarded: Bambu AMS 2 Pro – Automatic Materials System and other accessories for the Bambu 3D printer
Project Description:
The AMS and accessories purchased through this funding were paired with the purchase of a new Bambu H2D printer. The acquisition of this printer significantly increased the options for 3D printing molecular models with multiple colors and a high level of details. These accessories made that printing processes more efficient and provided filament for developing our printing workflow. These models are particularly useful for the course BIOC 272: Biochemistry where students are asked to understand how the structure of biological molecules impacts their structure; however, students often have difficultly grasping the 3-dimensional structure of these models when viewed on the page or even when viewed in three-dimensional renders on a computer screen. Implementation of these models into class has already provided students a new way of engaging with this central tenet of biochemistry and we plan to continue to develop these models for use in biochemistry and other courses.
Thus far we have developed a work flow that works well for basic structures of biological molecules, opening the possibility for other faculty to print molecules best suited for their courses. However, preparing models does require preparation that can be time consuming to get it into the proper format meaning that this is not a high-throughput process.