A new type of 3D-printed plastic can easily be stretched, melted, and reformed, making it a perfect material for multiple industries.
Category: 3D printing – Page 3
Princeton engineers have developed a scalable 3D printing technique to produce soft plastics with customizable stretchiness and flexibility, while also being recyclable and cost-effective—qualities rarely combined in commercially available materials.
In a study published in Advanced Functional Materials, a team led by Emily Davidson detailed how they used thermoplastic elastomers—a class of widely available polymers—to create 3D-printed structures with adjustable stiffness. By designing the 3D printer’s print path, the engineers could program the plastic’s physical properties, allowing devices to stretch and flex in one direction while remaining rigid in another.
Davidson, an assistant professor of chemical and biological engineering, highlighted the potential applications of this technique in fields such as soft robotics, medical devices, prosthetics, lightweight helmets, and custom high-performance shoe soles.
3D-printed ‘ghost guns’, like the one Luigi Mangione allegedly used to kill a health care CEO, surge in popularity as law enforcement struggles to keep up
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By November 2024, 15 U.S. states had established regulations on ghost guns, though exact requirements vary. The rules typically require a serial number, background checks for firearm component purchases and reporting to authorities that a person is producing 3D-printed guns.
For instance, in New Jersey, a 2019 law mandates that all ghost guns have a serial number and be registered. Under current New York law, possession or distribution of a 3D-printed gun is classified as a misdemeanor. However, a proposed law seeks to elevate the manufacturing of firearms using 3D-printing technology to a felony offense.
As technology advances and rules evolve, criminals who use 3D-printed firearms will continue to pose threats to public safety and security, and governments will continue playing catch-up to effectively regulate these weapons.
When Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) achieved fusion ignition at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) in December 2022, the world’s attention turned to the prospect of how that breakthrough experiment — designed to secure the nation’s nuclear weapons stockpile — might also pave the way for virtually limitless, safe and carbon-free fusion energy.
Advanced 3D printing offers one potential solution to bridging the science and technology gaps presented by current efforts to make inertial fusion energy (IFE) power plants a reality.
“Now that we have achieved and repeated fusion ignition,” said Tammy Ma, lead for LLNL’s inertial fusion energy institutional initiative, “the Lab is rapidly applying our decades of know-how into solving the core physics and engineering challenges that come with the monumental task of building the fusion ecosystem necessary for a laser fusion power plant. The mass production of ignition-grade targets is one of these, and cutting-edge 3D printing could help get us there.”
Scientists at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore (NTU Singapore) have pioneered a 3D concrete printing method that captures and stores carbon dioxide, marking a major step toward reducing the construction industry’s environmental footprint.
The innovative technique offers a promising solution to mitigate cement’s massive carbon emissions.
The process works by integrating CO₂ and steam—byproducts of industrial processes—into the concrete mix during 3D printing. As the material is printed, CO₂ reacts with components in the concrete, forming a solid, stable compound that remains locked within the structure.
Engineers at Johns Hopkins University have developed a new printing technique that solves for the fundamental weakness between the layers created during 3D printing. New printing technique allows them to precisely control interfaces between voxels, the three-dimensional counterparts to pixels, and how they function.
A 21-year-old Edmontonian is developing a 3D printer designed to take soil from the moon and convert it into essential equipment for astronauts.
Madison Feehan, CEO and founder of Space Copy, said she realized that 3D printing could substantially reduce the significant cost and logistic hurdles of sending astronauts back to the moon during her five years as a contract worker for NASA.
Radio Active’s Min Dhariwal spoke with Feehan this week to learn more about her research.
Yongcui Mi has developed a new technology that enables real-time shaping and control of laser beams for laser welding and directed energy deposition using laser and wire. The innovation is based on the same mirror technology used in advanced telescopes for astronomy.
In a few years, this new technology could lead to more efficient and reliable ways of using high-power lasers for welding and directed energy deposition with laser and wire. The manufacturing industry could benefit from new opportunities to build more robust processes that meet stringent quality standards.
“We are the first to use deformable mirror technology for this application. The mirror optics can handle multi-kilowatt laser power, and with the help of computer vision and AI, the laser beam can be shaped in real time to adapt to variations in joint gaps,” explains Yongcui, a newly minted Ph.D. in Production technology from University West.
Electrostatic discharge (ESD) protection is a significant concern in the chemical and electronics industries. In electronics, ESD often causes integrated circuit failures due to rapid voltage and current discharges from charged objects, such as human fingers or tools.
With the help of 3D printing techniques, researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) are “packaging” electronics with printable elastomeric silicone foams to provide both mechanical and electrical protection of sensitive components. Without suitable protection, substantial equipment and component failures may occur, leading to increased costs and potential workplace injuries. The team’s research is featured in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces.
3D printing is a rapidly growing manufacturing method that enables the production of cellular foams with customizable pore architectures to achieve compressive mechanical properties that can be tailored to minimize permanent deformation by evenly distributing stress throughout the printed architecture.
Researchers at the University of Twente, Netherlands, have made an advancement in bioprinting technology that could transform how we create vascularized tissues. Their innovative bioink, recently featured in Advanced Healthcare Materials, introduces a way to precisely guide the growth and organization of tiny blood vessels within 3D-bioprinted tissues. The tiny blood vessels mimic the intricate networks found in the human body.
3D-printed organs have the potential to revolutionize medicine by providing solutions for organ failure, and tissue damage and developing new therapies. But a major challenge is ensuring these printed tissues receive enough nutrients and oxygen, which is critical for their survival and function. Without blood vessels, these tissues can’t efficiently obtain nutrients or remove waste, limiting their effectiveness. Therefore, the ability to 3D-bioprint blood vessels is a crucial advancement.
Tissue engineers could already position blood vessels during the bioprinting process, but these vessels often remodel unpredictably when cultured in the lab or implanted in the body, reducing the effectiveness of the engineered tissue. The programmable bioink developed by the University of Twente team addresses this issue by providing dynamic control over vessel growth and remodeling over time. This opens new possibilities for creating engineered tissues with long-term functionality and adaptability.