Printed human skin sounded like some kind of sci-fi fantasy when the idea first emerged a decade ago. Now, like so many futuristic ideas that have come to fruition, bioprinting is not only here but it’s become cheaper, faster, and smaller. It may soon be ready for mainstream use.

PrintAlive is a compact bioprinter, about the size of a hardcover book, that can print synthetic skin much more quickly and affordably than any other competing device on the market. Designed by PhD students at the University of Toronto, it recently won the 2014 James Dyson Award.

PrintAlive uses a patient’s own skin cells to produce a skin-like material–complete with hair follicles and sweat glands–without them having to endure the painful process of having skin grafted from another part of the body. In addition to minimizing pain for patients, the device also promises to reduce another critical metric for burn victims and others in need of new skin: speed.

“The write speed of our bioprinter is between 10x to 100x higher than the commercial counterparts,” says Alex Guenther, the University of Toronto professor who oversaw the development of PrintAlive.

The device is still limited to academic research usage, but by the time it’s ready for a commercial release, PrintAlive will be competing against several incumbents. Organovo, EnvisionTEC, and RegenHu have been working on bringing the rapid prototyping revolution to human flesh for years. And the U.S. military is aggressively testing its own bioprinting devices for battlefield skin grafts and other regenerative medical applications.

The write speed of our bioprinter is between 10x to 100x higher than the commercial counterparts.

Yet there are several features that make PrintAlive stand out from its competition. In addition to being significantly faster, smaller, and cheaper than existing bioprinters, it’s also mechanically more efficient.

“Our printer does not require a motorized stage,” says Guenther. “In fact, it does not possess any moving parts, except for the printed tissue that is collected on a rotating drum. Only the bio-ink moves by controllably flowing within a proprietary printer cartridge.”