Current challenges and potential directions towards precision microscale additive manufacturing – Part IV: Future perspectives

Abstract

Microscale additive manufacturing is one of the fastest growing areas of research within the additive manufacturing community. However, there are still significant challenges that exist in terms of available materials, resolution, throughput, and ability to fabricate true three-dimensional geometries. These challenges render commercialization of currently available microscale additive manufacturing processes difficult. This paper is the last one in a four-part series of articles which review the current state-of-the-art of microscale additive manufacturing technologies and investigate the factors that currently limit each microscale additive manufacturing technology in terms of materials, resolution, throughput, and ability to fabricate complex geometries. Parts I, II and III offer prognoses about the future viability and applications of each technology along with suggested future research directions that could be used to bring each process technology in line with its fundamental, physics-based limitations. This paper brings together the general design guidelines that must be followed while designing scalable microscale AM processes. Finally, the paper concludes with an analysis of the role of precision engineering in the future advancement of microscale additive manufacturing technologies. This series of publications is a joint effort by the members and affiliates of the Micro-Nano Technical Leadership Committee of the American Society for Precision Engineering (ASPE).