A framework for teaching the fundamentals of additive manufacturing and enabling rapid innovation

Abstract

The importance of additive manufacturing (AM) to the future of product design and manufacturing infrastructure demands educational programs tailored to embrace its fundamental principles and its innovative potential. Moreover, the breadth and depth of AM spans several traditional disciplines, presenting a challenge to instructors, along with the opportunity to integrate knowledge via creative and demanding projects. This paper presents our approach to teaching AM at the graduate and advanced undergraduate level, in the form of a 14-week course developed and taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The lectures begin with in-depth technical analysis of the major AM processes and machine technologies, then focus on special topics including design methods, machine controls, applications of AM to major industry needs, and emerging processes and materials. In lab sessions, students operate and characterize desktop AM machines, and work in teams to design and fabricate a bridge having maximum strength per unit weight while conforming to geometric constraints. The class culminates in a semester-long team design-build project. In a single semester of the course, teams created prototype machines for 3D printing of molten glass, 3D printing of soft-serve ice cream, robotic deposition of biodegradable material, direct-write deposition of continuous carbon fiber composites, large-area parallel extrusion of polymers, and in situ optical scanning during 3D printing. Several of these projects led to patent applications, follow-on research, and peer-reviewed publications. We conclude that AM education, while arguably rooted in mechanical engineering, is truly multidisciplinary, and that education programs must embrace this context. We also comment on student feedback, our experience as instructional staff, and our adaptation of this course to a manufacturing-focused master’s degree program and a one-week professional short program. Keywords: Education; Teaching; Design; Laboratory; Project