Research Mission

Additive Manufacturing (AM) processes for metals such as Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF) have the potential to revolutionize product development and design as well as the structure of future supply chains. However, since the underlying physics are not well understood, their potential can not be fully exploited at presence. Sub-optimal process conditions lead to severe defects on different scales, rendering parts unsuitable for use. Critically, known regimes of stable processing go along with very low built rates, i.e., very high costs compared to other processes. This limits LPBF to selected high value applications such as medical devices but prohibits applications in mass production where it otherwise could allow for entirely new technologies.

By modeling the different length scales governing these processes, we aim to gain fundamental understanding of the underlying physics and, eventually, to inspire new process strategies overcoming the short comings of existing processes. In particular, our overall approach considers the modeling of metal powders and powder spreading processes, meltpool modeling, part-scale modeling and microstructure modeling in metal additive manufacturing (see, Meier et al. 2017, Meier et al. 2021). While the main focus lies on LPBF, we have shown in our recent publication (Fuchs et al. 2022) that many of the developed modeling and simulation approaches can be transferred to other AM processes such as Binder Jetting (BJ), Directed Energy Deposition (DED) and Material Jetting (MJ).