By: Masoud Alimardani

The use of multi-material structures has shown a rapid increase in the past decade due to new fabrication technologies. In many different multidisciplinary engineering applications such as biomedical applications inconsistent material properties are required in order to enhance mechanical properties and functionality of an object. Conventional methods cannot properly create objects in which materials change gradually from one to another. Sharp interfaces between different materials cause stress concentrations that ultimately create delamination and cracks between layers of different materials. Another major problem in fabrication of multi-material structures is controlling the variation of different desired materials. Laser Solid Freeform Fabrication (LSFF) technique has great potential for the creation of multi-material structures in which material composition varies from one layer to another or from one point to another point in the same layer. Continue reading →