#4d printing

[materialsscienceandengineering]

Scientists create smart synthetic skin that can hide images and change shape

This single, soft material can combine camouflage, encryption, and shape-morphing all at once.

Synthetic materials are widely used across science, engineering, and industry, but most are designed to perform only a narrow range of tasks. A research team at Penn State set out to change that. Led by Hongtao Sun, assistant professor of industrial and manufacturing engineering (IME), the group developed a new fabrication technique that can produce multifunctional "smart synthetic skin." These adaptable materials can be programmed to perform a wide variety of tasks, including hiding or revealing information, enabling adaptive camouflage, and supporting soft robotic systems. Using this new approach, the researchers created a programmable smart skin made from hydrogel, a soft, water-rich material. Unlike conventional synthetic materials with fixed behaviors, this smart skin can be tuned to respond in multiple ways. Its appearance, mechanical behavior, surface texture, and ability to change shape can all be adjusted when the material is exposed to external triggers such as heat, solvents, or physical stress.

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[bioengr]

Soft robots and biomedical implants that reconfigure themselves upon demand are closer to reality with a new way to print shapeshifting materials. Rafael Verduzco and graduate student Morgan Barnes of Rice’s Brown School of Engineering developed a method to print objects that can be manipulated to take on alternate forms when exposed to changes in temperature, electric current or stress.

credit: rice university

[intelligentliving]

Shapeshifting Robots Could Become A Reality With 4D Printing

Rice University researchers are paving the way to developing soft robots that can adapt to the world around them. They developed a 3D printing technique, which they call reactive 4D printing, for making material that morphs into different shapes when exposed to changes in temperature, tension, or an electric current....

[kenyatta]

(via SUTD and NTU collaboration yields reversible 4D printing - 3D Printing Industry)

When the shape of a 3D printed object changes over time, it is referred to as 4D printing. Reversible 4D printing refers to the ability to then change back to the original 3D printed shape. The initial changes in shape are usually caused by either heat or water, but the reversion often requires manual input in the form of stretching or pulling, which can be time-consuming and arduous.

Researchers have given automated reversible 4D printing some attention in recent years, with hydrogel being the main stimulus used to achieve reversibility without human intervention. Hydrogel lacks mechanical strength, however, so it is limited in its applications. Further work has utilized various layers of material as an alternative to hydrogel, but the procedure was only made more tedious.

[...]

“While reversible 4D printing in itself is a great advancement, being able to use a more robust material while ensuring a more precise reversal during shape change is revolutionary as it allows us to produce complex structures that cannot easily be achieved through conventional fabrication. By relying on environmental conditions instead of electricity, it makes it a game changer across various industries, completely changing the way we design, create, package and ship products,” said Professor Chua Chee Kai, lead researcher and Head of Engineering Product Development in SUTD.

[roboticsappreciationsociety]

New Class of Metamaterials Changes Physical Properties in Seconds

Mechanical metamaterials can have their rigidity tuned, offering a new approach to soft robotics

Metamaterials seem like a technology out of science fiction. Because of the way these materials affect electromagnetic phenomena and physical attributes of materials.

A team of researchers from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and the University of California San Diego (UCSD) have used so-called mechanical metamaterials—which exhibit unique mechanical properties that do not exist in nature—to create a novel material that can change from rigid to flexible in response to a magnetic field. The researchers expect this new material could usher in new approaches to smart wearables and soft robotics.

The material is rigid in the presence of a magnetic field

When the magnetic field is removed, the material becomes flexible

To create their tunable mechanical metamaterials, the researchers turned to so-called “four-dimensional” printing. It gets its name from the fact that such 3D printed objects change form or shape over time, with time being the fourth dimension. Typically, a structure of this type responds to a stimulus (e.g. heat, hydration, or magnetic field) that causes it to change shape.

The field-responsive metamaterials (FRMMs) developed by the researchers change their properties in response to a variation in a magnetic field. However, unlike typical 4D printed materials, they do not change their overall shape but instead change their stiffness.

[wheredoidesign-blog]

Printing a House

This couldn’t be used to save thousands of people......

1 day to make 10 houses

Time effective

Cost effective

Could be sent worldwide from 1 computer

Stability 

Sustainability 

Accurate

COULD SAVE LIVES EVERYWHERE

[materialsscienceandengineering]

Researchers make breakthrough in bioprinting functional human heart tissue

Researchers have developed a way of bioprinting tissues that change shape as a result of cell-generated forces, in the same way that it happ

Researchers at University of Galway have developed a way of bioprinting tissues that change shape as a result of cell-generated forces, in the same way that it happens in biological tissues during organ development. The breakthrough science focused on replicating heart tissues, bringing research closer to generating functional, bioprinted organs, which would have broad applications in disease modelling, drug screening and regenerative medicine. The research was led by a team at the School of Engineering and CÚRAM Research Ireland Centre for Medical Devices at University of Galway and has been published in the journal Advanced Functional Materials.

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[materialsscienceandengineering]

Butterfly-inspired 4D printing of smart hydrogels enables precise micro-nano deformation

A Chinese research team has developed a single-step femtosecond laser 4D printing technology that enables rapid and precise micro-scale deformation of smart hydrogels. This innovation, inspired by the hierarchical structure of butterfly wings, holds significant promise for applications in flexible electronics and minimally invasive medicine. The findings were published online in ACS Materials Letters on February 17. Led by Prof. Liu Lianqing from the Shenyang Institute of Automation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Prof. Li Wenjung from the City University of Hong Kong, the researchers drew inspiration from the wing structure of Papilio maackii, a butterfly species known for its remarkable balance of lightness and toughness.

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