Living skin (developed by researchers of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute) is a technique to 3D print artificial skin with artificial blood vessels. After printing, the skin is first cultivated in-vitro, before it can be transplanted. Animal testing has shown that the artificial blood vessels can merge with the organic blood vessels after a few weeks. This is a technological breakthrough. Existing artificial skin applications often worked as a kind of plaster that supports wound healing, but were usually rejected after a while because the integration with the body’s own blood vessels was missing. The technique is primarily suited for all kinds of wounds and sores, but burns are still very complex because they often involve seared nerve endings and blood vessels.
