Smart Additive Manufacturing, Design and Evaluation

Dear Colleagues,

Additive manufacturing and 3D printing technologies are globally recognized as novel fabrication processes for advanced materials and components with multifunctional structures. These technologies offer tremendous potential for design innovations and customization, complex part fabrication, rapid prototyping, and distributed digital manufacturing. In this approach, three-dimensional models are designed and created according to theoretical concepts using computer software, and two-dimensional cross-sections are created by slicing operations automatically. Computer-aided design, manufacture, and evaluation are referred to as smart additive processing. In lithography-based approaches, high-resolution laser or electron beams are scanned on a spread metal or ceramic powder bed with or without resin binders to form solid planes of two-dimensional cross-sections. In deposition processes, paste materials with ceramic/metal particles dispersed in a binder system are fused from nozzles moving freely in three dimensions to create composite structures. Outstanding coating and patterning processes are used to modify surface functions of the fabricated 3D components. Various functional metal or ceramic components of dielectric or magnetic lattices to control electromagnetic fields, electrodes or catalysts with large surface areas, and bio-materials components for medical applications could also be developed. Large scale structural components for aerospace and other high-temperature applications can be fabricated with internal cooling path networks formed without casting molds. By using Smart Additive Manufacturing, Design, and Evaluation, practical metal and ceramic components with functionally geometric structures are developed to modulate effectively energy dispersions and mass transfers through computer-aided theoretical design, automatic manufacture and visualized evaluation. Smart processes that will help to realize a sustainable society will be discussed through topics related to the following keywords.

Prof. Dr. Soshu Kirihara
Guest Editor

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