13 - Roadmapping 4D printing through disruptive ideas

Abstract

With high growth scientific developments (about 40%/year in publications rate) and a small economic market (a few tens of millions €/year compared to 30 billion €/year for additive manufacturing), 4D printing—an interdisciplinary, spectacular, and attractive field—is achieving undeniable academic recognition, but still has difficulty finding niche applications for reasons based on the current low capacity of the smart materials used in additive manufacturing. The high concentration of scientific work on the interactions between manufacturing processes, actuation, and materials that can be activated by different stimulations only imperfectly overcomes the barriers that could open up the exciting field to industrial and profitable applications. After showing how this concentration on the aspects presented above and their application limits, the authors aim to identify the ways of divergence keeping the pioneering spirit of 4D printing to open up this promising field of innovation. With this in mind, the authors will propose a discussion of their ideas in the form of a roadmap associated with appropriate organizational considerations.