3D printing restores crane's broken beak

An animal hospital in Guangzhou recently installed an artificial beak on an injured red-crowned crane using 3D printing technology. (Photo/Xinhua)

An animal hospital in Guangzhou recently installed an artificial beak on an injured red-crowned crane using 3D printing technology. It was the first time such an operation had been performed.

The crane, named Lili, was sent to the hospital in early June after losing almost half of its upper beak due to a brawl with other animals in the zoo. Being unable to forage, the bird's life was endangered. Nurses had to spend 2-3 hours each day feeding it around 100 loaches to keep it alive.

The red-crowned crane is an endangered species and a first class national protected animal in China. There are barely 1,000 of them still surviving. A crane's lifespan is normally 50-60 years, but the injured Lili is just six years old, meaning that the beak replacement will have to last for the next five decades. This is why medical experts decided against plastic material and agreed upon titanium alloy.

Fearing that the artificial beak would have to undergo many costly modifications, the team chose to install plastic trial versions on the injured bird to test their integrity while collecting data to ensure that the final metal artificial beak would be flawless.

Lili received the operation on July 10. After waking up from anesthesia, the bird realized it had a new beak and successfully tried catching a fish in a pail with it.

Lili is able to feed on her own now.