Dear all,

As the COVID 19 pandemic continues to affect us all, we here at Dr. Mabel Cheng and Dr. Nicole Lemanski’s office thought we would share some good news with you. As some may be aware, our office’s 3D printing labs, normally used for research, retuned to produced Personal Protective Equipment, or PPE. We are happy to announce that in the past 4 weeks, our office has produced 1200 face shields, visors, and mask “ear” protectors. These items have been distributed at no charge to multiple places in need, including: The Niskayuna Police Department, the Albany VA, hospitals in NYC (through NYCPPE) and Florida, physicians practicing in the Capital Region, Restaurants in Schenectady, and the UAlbany CEHC print group (which assembles and distributes to other first responders and health care groups in the greater capital region). We are happy to continue providing this service free of charge during these extraordinary times.

“These 3Dverkstan visors are arguably the most popular 3D printed face shields in the US, and have been validated for emergency use from the National Institutes of Health” notes Dr. Mabel Cheng. “Without a doubt, they are critical in addressing the severe PPE shortage in the US that COVID-19 has brought to light.

A Lulzbot TAZ6 (left) busily produces much needed face shields in the 3D print lab while a stack of 100 visors (center) is prepped for assembly and shipment.

“In addition to producing 3D printed designs, the office has also been busy redesigning ophthalmology PPE designs for ophthalmologists and optometrists to use” adds Dr. Nicole Lemanski. “It is important that we act in whatever capacity is possible to also protect our colleagues.” The designs, reworked from an Israeli group, are available on the NIH Print hub for anyone to use: https://3dprint.nih.gov/users/bcplemanski

Dr. Lemanski, wearing an office remixed design of a shield for an Keeler All Pupil II Indirect Ophthalmoscope (a device used to examine the retina).

A screenshot of the current contribution of the office’s computer network to the Folding@home computational folding grid.