A Beautiful World: Innovation, good will craft prosthetic arms in Sudan

Daniel Omar and his new prosthetic arm
Daniel Omar sports a new prosthetic arm made from a 3D printer.
Courtesy of Not Impossible Labs

When Mick Ebeling learned about a 14-year-old boy named Daniel Omar who had lost both arms during a bombing raid and was living in a refugee camp in Sudan, he decided to do something. But what? Ebeling, a television producer in Los Angeles, had no medical training.

Ebeling put out a call for ideas, designs and resources. Simply put, he crowdsourced the problem. An innovative solution for a prosthetic arm emerged. This design didn't require batteries or electricity. It was completely weather and waterproof. Best of all, the entire arm could be made cheaply on a 3-D printer.

Ebeling traveled with the prosthetic arm design and a 3-D printer to the refugee camp in the Nuba Mountains. There, he fitted Omar with a new pair of arms and established the first 3D-printing prosthetic lab and training facility in Sudan.

More information about Project Daniel is available here.

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