Progress and Perspectives in Metal Laser Additive Manufacturing

Special Issue Editors

Dyson School of Design Engineering, Imperial College London, London SW7 2DB, UK
Interests: metal forming; additive manufacturing; friction stir welding; friction drilling; laser transmission welding and heat treatment
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Materials, Sun Yat-sen University, Shenzhen 518107, China
Interests: metal additive manufacturing; laser powder bed fusion; multi-material additive manufacturing; dissimilar metal welding; AI-driven quality inspection and quantitative defect analysis for metal additive manufacturing and welding
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Laser-based additive manufacturing (AM) of metals has emerged as a transformative technology in advanced manufacturing, offering unprecedented capabilities in producing complex geometries, reducing material waste, and enabling rapid prototyping to final-part production. Over the past decade, significant progress has been made in both fundamental understanding and industrial adoption of metal laser AM technologies, including laser powder bed fusion (L-PBF), directed energy deposition (DED), selective laser sintering (SLS), and beyond.

This Special Issue aims to highlight the latest advances, unresolved challenges, and future opportunities in the field. Key topics include, but are not limited to, process modelling and simulation, microstructure investigation and property optimisation, development of novel alloys for AM, real-time process monitoring and control, as well as strategies for post-processing, feedstock recycling and quality assurance. Contributions addressing scalability, sustainability, and application-driven innovations are also highly encouraged.

By bringing together state-of-the-art research, technical developments, and frontier perspectives, this Special Issue seeks to facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration and drive innovation in the rapidly evolving field of metal laser additive manufacturing.

Dr. Hao Wu
Dr. Chaoqun Zhang
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Journal of Manufacturing and Materials Processing is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • metal additive manufacturing
  • laser powder bed fusion
  • directed energy deposition
  • selective laser sintering

Benefits of Publishing in a Special Issue

  • Ease of navigation: Grouping papers by topic helps scholars navigate broad scope journals more efficiently.
  • Greater discoverability: Special Issues support the reach and impact of scientific research. Articles in Special Issues are more discoverable and cited more frequently.
  • Expansion of research network: Special Issues facilitate connections among authors, fostering scientific collaborations.
  • External promotion: Articles in Special Issues are often promoted through the journal's social media, increasing their visibility.
  • Reprint: MDPI Books provides the opportunity to republish successful Special Issues in book format, both online and in print.

Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.

Published Papers (1 paper)

Order results
Result details
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:

Research

14 pages, 1706 KiB  
Communication
Enhancing Fatigue Life of Metal Parts Produced by High-Speed Laser Powder Bed Fusion Through In Situ Surface Quality Improvement
by Daniel Ordnung, Mirko Sinico, Thibault Mertens, Han Haitjema and Brecht Van Hooreweder
J. Manuf. Mater. Process. 2025, 9(7), 207; https://doi.org/10.3390/jmmp9070207 - 20 Jun 2025
Viewed by 212
Abstract
The poor surface quality of the metal parts produced by laser powder bed fusion limits their application in load-bearing components, as it promotes crack initiation under cyclic loadings. Consequently, improving part quality relies on time-consuming surface finishing. This work explores a dual-laser powder [...] Read more.
The poor surface quality of the metal parts produced by laser powder bed fusion limits their application in load-bearing components, as it promotes crack initiation under cyclic loadings. Consequently, improving part quality relies on time-consuming surface finishing. This work explores a dual-laser powder bed fusion strategy to simultaneously improve the productivity, surface quality, and fatigue life of parts with inclined up-facing surfaces made from a novel tool steel. This is achieved by combining building using a high layer thickness of 120 μm with in situ quality enhancement through powder removal and laser remelting. A bending fatigue campaign was conducted to assess the performance of such treated samples produced with different layer thicknesses (60 μm, hull-bulk 60/120 μm, 120 μm) compared to as-built and machined reference samples. Remelting consistently enhanced the fatigue life compared to the as-built reference samples by up to a factor of 36. The improvement was attributed to the reduced surface roughness, the reduced critical stress concentration factors, and the gradually changing surface features with increased lateral dimensions. This led to a beneficial load distribution and fewer potential crack initiation points. Finally, the remelting samples produced with a layer thickness of 120 μm enhanced the fatigue life by a factor of four and reduced the production time by 30% compared to the standard approach using a layer thickness of 60 μm. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Progress and Perspectives in Metal Laser Additive Manufacturing)
Show Figures

Graphical abstract

Back to TopTop