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New legal limits in traffic for drugs other than alcohol : table showing the impairment based legislative limits and limits for graded sanctions for drugs other than alcohol, from Feb. 1, 2012. Credit: Copyright: Norwegian Institute of Public Health

Scientists are pioneering the use of 3D printers to create drugs and other chemicals at the University of Glasgow. Researchers have used a £1,250 system to create a range of organic compounds and inorganic clusters - some of which are used to create cancer treatments. Longer term, the scientists say the process could be used to make customised medicines.

Nano-cargo jet rockets were useful tasks in the body can perform. Packets deliver drugs or substances to signal tumor. Science fiction? Nope, not anymore. Nature chemistry published in February a paper of Nijmegen chemists which they explain how they make a nano rocket. "We think this is the first real nanomotor," says lead author Daniela Wilson.

Professor Lee Cronin is a likably impatient presence, a one-man catalyst. "I just want to get stuff done fast," he says. And: "I am a control freak in rehab." Cronin, 39, is the leader of a world-class team of 45 researchers at Glasgow University, primarily making complex molecules. But that is not the extent of his ambition. A couple of years ago, at a TED conference, he described one goal as the creation of "inorganic life", and went on to detail his efforts to generate "evolutionary algorithms" in inert matter. He still hopes to "create life" in the next year or two.