Additive Manufacturing
COMMON CHALLENGES
Additive manufacturing, also known as 3D printing, is revolutionizing industries by enabling the creation of complex geometries, lightweight structures, and customized components. As adoption grows across aerospace, medical, automotive, and consumer sectors, so does the need for improved performance, reliability, and scalability.
To meet these demands, researchers and engineers must address key challenges, such as material consistency, mechanical integrity, surface finish, and residual stress. These performance metrics are influenced by fundamental factors like microstructure evolution, thermal gradients, phase transformations, and build orientation.
Understanding the relationships between process parameters and material properties is essential. Characterizing features such as grain structure, porosity, and elemental distribution provides critical insights into how additive processes affect the final part’s strength, durability, and functionality.
INNOVATIVE TECHNIQUES
Several techniques are available to better characterize and understand crucial material property relationships in additively manufactured materials.
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Examine crystallographic orientation and texture in materials.
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Analyze, quantify, and map the distribution of elements in a specimen.
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Identify and quantify light elements such as lithium and oxygen in your specimen.
Determine the oxidation state of important elements, such as transition metals.
Map the elemental distribution of your specimen down to the atomic scale.
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Study morphology and crystal structure at varying (electro)chemical states.
Apply 4D STEM techniques for virtual imaging and diffraction, along with mapping crystalline strain.
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Apply various stimuli and observe phase transformations and changing elemental distributions in real-time.
Use low-dose techniques to study the dynamic phenomena and sensitive materials without beam effects. |
Determine the elemental composition of materials with high spatial resolution.
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