Here at 3D Rapid Print, one of the fastest growing 3D Printing companies in the Thames Valley, we like to keep abreast of the latest innovations in 3D printing.
Circa July 2019, 17-year-old BD Somani International School student Siddharth Pillai of Mumbai installed India’s first 3D printed coral reef on the coast of Puducherry, southeast India. The project was funded via a crowdfunding campaign on the Indian crowdfunding website Ketto. Having been actively scuba diving for the past several years, he was prompted by seeing India’s coral reefs being increasingly damaged by climate change. He named the reef Bennington’s Reef, in honour of former Linkin Park vocalist Chester Bennington, who sadly committed suicide in July 2017.
In May 2018, Pillai did a 3D printing course at the Curiosity Gym innovation hub of Churchgate, South Mumbai. At the time, he also met marine biologist and Temple Reef Foundation CEO Suneha Jagannathan, who agreed to help him with the necessary resources and guided him on the project. (The Temple Reef Foundation is the conservation wing of the Temple Adventures dive centre.) Pillai subsequently started designing a structure to resemble the natural coral bed, which also had to be porous to enable the coral to attach themselves to it. In October 2018, he installed a prototype version of the reef with blocks made from a mixture of cement and dolomite, which was monitored over 6 months for growth of life. When this was successful, he expanded the prototype reef with 200 3D printed blocks made from the same material.
Interest in 3D printed reefs has arguably increased as a direct result of Alex Goad of Melbourne’s Reef Design Lab inventing the Modular Artificial Reef Structure in 2013. Reef Design Lab also designed the world’s largest 3D printed coral reef, which was installed in the Maldives in August 2018.
3D printing is an amazing tool. It can grow your small business or start a mini revolution in an industry. Explore what it can do for you when you contact us today.
Disclaimer: Featured image of “Coral Reef in the Red Sea” is a work of a United States Agency for International Development employee, taken or made as part of that person’s official duties. As a work of the U.S. federal government, the image is in the public domain in the United States.
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