Layer by metal layer, a complex component began to take shape with the help of an additive manufacturing machine -- known as a 3-D printer to most people -- and a clutch of USC engineering students at the region's newest center devoted to building better stuff and creating jobs. The part was being made for a Southern California company that was trying out an improved design but didn't have the machinery to produce something involving complicated shapes and angles. "We looked at the geometry and said'we should be able to,' and we printed it for them," said Satyandra K. Gupta, a USC professor and director of the Center for Advanced Manufacturing. The collaboration with the company, which had asked Gupta for complete secrecy to avoid tipping off competitors, was one of the first for the Center for Advanced Manufacturing. The facility opened in February as part of a $253-million Defense Department-sponsored consortium of dozens of corporations, schools, nonprofits and local governments around the country.

There was a time when doctors made house calls. That time is coming again, except now your doctor will be able to make 100 at once, while performing surgery at the same time. Dr. Leslie Saxon's USC Center for Body Computing and USC's Virtual Care Clinic leverage commercial tech innovations to advance medical care and delivery. "First thing we have to do is take your picture," says Dr. Leslie Saxon, Founder and Director of USC's Center for Body Computing, as she enthusiastically greets me at the Playa Vista campus location of the recently opened Virtual Care Clinic. I'm here to learn about the still nascent yet rapidly expanding field of digital medicine, and Dr. Saxon wants to show me what the face of the medical future that she envisions will look like--it turns out, just like an actual face, in fact.