AI SpaceFactory, a space architecture and technology design agency, recently won first prize in NASA’s competition to build a prototype Mars habitat.
Tiny, 3D printed cubes of plastic, with intricate fractal voids built into them, have proven to be effective at dissipating shockwaves, potentially leading to new types of lightweight armor and structural materials effective against explosions and impacts.
“The goal of the work is to manipulate the wave interactions resulting from a shockwave,” said Dana Dattelbaum, a scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory and lead author on a paper to appear in the journal AIP Advances. “The guiding principles for how to do so have not been well defined, certainly less so compared to mechanical deformation of additively manufactured materials. We’re defining those principles, due to advanced, mesoscale manufacturing and design.”
Shockwave dispersing materials that take advantage of voids have been developed in the past, but they typically involved random distributions discovered through trial and error. Others have used layers to reverberate shock and release waves. Precisely controlling the location of holes in a material allows the researchers to design, model and test structures that perform as designed, in a reproducible way.
Charles Goulding and Ryan Donley of R&D Tax Savers discuss 3D printing as it impacts chocolateering.
Chocolate has been around for millennia now, dating as far back as early 1750 B.C., presumably in the area of the Gulf Coast of Vera Cruz where cocoa beverages or chocolate drinks were used in ceremonies by pre-Olmec peoples. Evidence suggests cacao pods may have even been used in alcoholic beverages as early as 1400 B.C. Today, the cacao bean has evolved to encompass a $50 billion chocolate industry worldwide that consists of edible chocolate confections being brought to mass markets.
Israeli company Redefine Meat has unveiled the world’s first vegan 3D-printed burger and it could be hitting restaurants soon.
Relativity Space, a growing startup that aims to almost entirely 3D-print rockets, on Wednesday announced it struck another major launch deal, as well as an agreement with the U.S. Air Force, to build a launchpad on the California coastline.
The Los Angeles-based rocket builder signed an agreement with satellite operator Iridium Communications, to launch up to six satellites as needed as early as 2023. Over the course of more than half a dozen launches with SpaceX, Iridium completed its second-generation satellite constellation in January 2019, with 66 operational satellites and 9 spares in orbit.
The Iridium deal means Relativity now has agreements to launch for five different companies, having previously announced contracts with Canadian satellite communications operator Telesat, California-based Momentus, Thai satellite broadband company mu Space and Seattle-based Spaceflight Inc. All the contracts have remarkably come before Relativity’s first launch, which is scheduled to happen before the end of 2021.
Brilliantly colored chameleons, butterflies, opals—and now some 3D-printed materials—reflect color by using nanoscale structures called photonic crystals.
A new study that demonstrates how a modified 3D-printing process provides a versatile approach to producing multiple colors from a single ink is published in the journal Science Advances.
Continue reading “Researchers mimic nature for fast, colorful 3D printing” »
Their new approach to 3D bioprinting and allows for non-invasive tissue growth and wound healing. It works through injecting bioink cells, the additive material traditionally used in 3D bioprinting, under the skin and using near-infrared light to penetrate the tissue and transfer customizable building designs — like an ear or an abstract shape — to newly injected cells.
The ear began to form in just 20 seconds.
Using a new approach to 3D bioprinting researchers have designed a way to non-invasively grow a wide range of customizable tissue under living skin.
At the Department of Energy Manufacturing Demonstration Facility at ORNL, this part for a scaled-down prototype of a reactor was produced for industry partner Kairos Power. Credit: Kairos Power.
Biological tissues have evolved over millennia to be perfectly optimized for their specific functions. Take cartilage as an example. It’s a compliant, elastic tissue that’s soft enough to cushion joints, but strong enough to resist compression and withstand the substantial load bearing of our bodies: key for running, jumping, and our daily wear and tear.
When it comes to monitoring electrical activity in the brain, patients typically have to lie very still inside a large magnetoencephalography (MEG) machine. That could be about to change, though, as scientists have developed a new version of a wearable helmet that does the same job.
Back in 2018, researchers at Britain’s University of Nottingham revealed the original version of their “MEG helmet.”
The 3D-printed device was fitted with multiple sensors that allowed it to read the tiny magnetic fields created by brain waves, just like a regular MEG machine. Unlike the case with one of those, however, wearers could move around as those readings were taking place.
