First, however, the Queensland University of Technology and the Brisbane-based Hear and Say Centre must perfect the art of creating prosthetic ears.

But a lack of government support has forced them to try crowdfunding as a means to realise their vision.

QUT's Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation associate professor Mia Woodruff said the innovative research had simply fallen though the federal government's funding cracks.

And, given nobody else was researching 3D-printed biological external ears, Professor Woodruff said Australia had the chance to be a world-leader.

"We have the people, we have the resources, we just don't have the research funds to enable us to do that project, so we're turning to crowdfunding, because the people get it," she said.

"The public understands that they can be part of this journey, that they can help contribute, even if it's just in a tiny, tiny way.

"...The public can help us, because the government at the moment are not enabling this project to proceed."

To understand how important the work was one only had to ask Adelaide mother Angelika Walton, who was in Brisbane on Sunday for the Hear and Say Centre's annual microtia workshop.

Ms Walton's 4½-year-old son, Ole, had two underdeveloped ears due to the condition.

Ole was among the one-in-12,000 children born with the condition.

"We don't know what the future, exactly, will bring but we're really impatient and quite excited by the prospect of everything that's going on now," Ms Walton said.

"We don't know what the future, exactly, will bring but we're really impatient and quite excited by the prospect of everything that's going on now."

The technology also presented a delightful dilemma for the Walton family – would Ole's ears be modelled on his mum's or dad's?

"Well, there'll be the debate of who's ears will he have," Ms Walton said.

"It will be very exciting, but every ear is different so it would be nice for him to have his own unique ones."

Hear and Say Centre executive director Dimity Dornan said the prosthetic ear campaign was a "huge leap" in both technology and funding techniques.

"It is absolutely a world first, when we can get to the stage where we're biofabricating the child's ear with the child's own skin and cartilage cells," she said.

"When that stage is reached, it is absolutely a world-first but what we are doing is, firstly, generating the next-generation prosthetic ear, which will be far better than anything else around.

"It's exactly the same as the ear they have on the other side, usually, and it will be completely matched using computer scanning and an app in an iPhone."

Professor Woodruff said she hoped the first prosthetic ears would be ready by the end of 2017, but what would follow was the main aim.

"The project goes beyond that – we're also creating biofabricated ears," she said.

"These are ears we're also 3D-printing, but we're using biocompatible sterile materials and we are culturing those in a bioreactor in a laboratory with cells taken from a patient and we are creating a living ear that will be implanted by a surgeon."

That breakthrough, Professor Woodruff said, would likely come early next decade.

"The prosthetic could be achieved by the end of next year and, if the funds come in for that project, it will enable and catapult the tissue-engineered ear to be able to be hopefully realised within a five-year timeframe," she said.

The campaign aimed to raise $200,000 in 45 days to fund the development of 3D printing technology for multi-material, flexible, lifelike prosthetic ears customised for each child with microtia.

Donations can be made via the FutureHear Pozible page.

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