Conference Agenda

Additive manufacturing (AM) is a key digital manufacturing technology leading to Industry 4.0 processes. Its digital input enables great flexibility and adaptability to changing markets, lot-size-of-1 and mass customization, and little if any lead-time since no hard tooling is needed. Its shape complexity capabilities enable part consolidation where several (or many) conventionally manufactured parts can be combined into one part with complex geometry. These characteristics can have major benefits for life-cycle costs and sustainability impacts of products containing AM parts. However, the AM processes themselves are not necessarily more efficient or environmentally friendly than conventional manufacturing (CM) processes. This talk explores opportunities for radically redesigning parts and products to take advantage of the unique capabilities of AM. After a consideration of the sustainability characteristics of AM processes, an analysis is offered of implications for product design. Results of life-cycle analyses (LCA) are highly dependent on the system extent being analyzed. Some alternative system extents are proposed to illustrate their effects. A design strategy is proposed for incorporating sustainability considerations into products and AM processes. Examples are used to illustrate the application of the design strategy. Throughout the talk, the emphasis is on exploring research issues rather than providing quantitative results.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH:

David Rosen is a Principal Research Scientist at the Institute for High Performance Computing and the Singapore Institute for Manufacturing Technology, both A*STAR institutes in Singapore. He was a Professor in the School of Mechanical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology for many years.  Additionally, he held faculty and research positions at the Singapore University of Technology & Design.  He received his Ph.D. at the University of Massachusetts in mechanical engineering.  His research interests include computer-aided design, additive manufacturing (AM), and design methodology, with a specific interest in design for additive manufacturing. He is a Fellow of ASME.  Also, he is the recipient of the 2013 Solid Freeform Fabrication Symposium, International Freeform and Additive Manufacturing Excellence (FAME) Award and is a co-author of a leading textbook on AM. In the standards community, he chairs the ASTM F42 subcommittee on design for additive manufacturing and was awarded the ASTM Award of Merit and promoted to Fellow of ASTM.