DoD Awards $4.5 Million to Ceramics 3D Printing

The United States pioneered the use of additive manufacturing in the defense sector, and their Department of Defense (DoD) continues to fund additive manufacturing research to this day. Through the Office of Naval Research (ORN), the DoD awarded a $4.5 million Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative grant to researchers based at Penn State to study the optimization of ceramic fabrication for 3D printing.

High-performance ceramics are commonly used in the aerospace and defense industries because they can withstand thousands of degrees Celsius and rapid temperature changes without degradation. However, the material is difficult to produce, and even more difficult to 3D print. To alleviate this issue, the DoD awarded this $4.5 million grant to researchers so they could study the use of laser processing to produce high-performance ceramics at lower temperatures. The scientists hope to enable ceramic fabrication through 3D printing by producing this material at lower temperatures.

Robert Hickey, one of the leaders of the research team (photo credits: Matthew Carroll)

Robert Hickey, associate professor of materials science and engineering at Penn State and one of the team leaders, and Michael Hickner, a professor at Michigan State University, are leading the team. Their project is titled “Photochemical and Photothermal Additive Manufacturing of Preceramic Polymers,” and according to an article from Penn State, it “seeks to create a one-step process to produce ultra-high-temperature ceramic materials without bulk heating.”