Inkbit, LLC

Bio-rad Laboratories, Inc.

Becton Dickinson and Company Limited

Embecta Corp.

Aaron Weber

Wojciech Matusik

Desai Chen

Gregory Ellson

Harrison Wang

Javier E Ramos

David H Tracy

Davide Marini

Sepehr Kiani

Tony Hung

Peter L Stokes

Nathaniel McCaffrey

John Prudden

James L Salemme

Walter Henry Zengerle, Iii

Kiril Vidimce

Michael Yarger

James Salemme

David Tracy

An approach to improving optical scanning increases the strength of optical reflection from the build material during fabrication. In some examples, the approach makes use of an additive (or a combination of multiple additives) that increases the received signal strength and/or improves the received signal-to-noise ratio in optical scanning for industrial metrology. Elements not naturally present in the material are introduced in the additives in order to increase fluorescence, scattering or luminescence. Such additives may include one or more of: small molecules, polymers, peptides, proteins, metal or semiconductive nanoparticles, and silicate nanoparticles.

Optical scanning for industrial metrology

A method includes generating correction data for a construction material that is used by an additive-manufacturing machine to manufacture an object. This correction data compensates for an interaction of the construction material with first radiation that has been used to illuminate the construction material.

Reflective coating for material calibration

An additive fabrication approach involves fabricating a platform on a build plate. The fabrication system is then calibrated based on the fabricated platform, and an object is then fabricating on the fabricated platform according to the calibration.

Calibration for additive manufacturing

A method for additive manufacturing includes forming an object including depositing a first material including a first coloring component and a second material including a second coloring component, wherein both the first material and the second material further include a corresponding fluorescent component, scanning the object, including causing an emission of an optical signal from the object, wherein the emission of the optical signal is caused at least in part by an emission from the fluorescent components interacting with the first coloring component and the second coloring component as it passes from the fluorescent components to the surface of the object, sensing the emission of the optical signal, and determining presence of the first material and the second material based at least in part on the sensed emission of the optical signal.

A profilometer provides, to a controller, a feedback signal indicative of topography of an exposed surface of an object that is being manufactured by a 3d printer. The profilometer includes an emitter and a camera. The emitter illuminates a region of surface of the object with a pattern having an edge that defines a boundary of an illuminated portion of the surface. The camera receives an image that transitions between a first state in which the edge is visible in the image at a location that is indicative of the surface's depth and a second state in which the edge is not visible at all. From this second state, the controller obtains information representative of a depth of the surface.

Edge profilometer

A method for managing the temperature of three-dimensional object during additive manufacturing includes depositing material on a partial fabrication of the three-dimensional object, determining thermal properties of the three-dimensional object after depositing the material, and controlling cooling of the object according to said thermal properties. In some examples, the determining of the thermal properties includes determining a temperature variation across the object and controlling position-dependent cooling of the object in a feedback arrangement. Resulting uniform temperature of the object under fabrication can improve dimensional accuracy and material properties of the object.

Thermal management for additive fabrication

A method for additive fabrication includes determining numerical calibration transforms for calibrating an imaging sensor and a printhead assembly to a common coordinate system, where at least some of the numerical calibration transforms include nonlinear transforms.

Calibration for additive manufacturing by compensating for geometric misalignments and distortions between components of a 3D printer

Methods and systems are provided for measuring a velocity of a droplet passing through a microfluidic channel.

Droplet velocity detection

A scanning approach used in the feedback procedure is able to distinguish between different materials, for example, based on spectral properties (e.g., color) of reflectance from a partially fabricated object. Because material layers can be quite thin, and in general the materials are not completely opaque, properties of subsurface layers can greatly affect the reflectance of a thin layer of one material over a thicker section of another material. Detection of locations of thin layers after a material change takes into account the reflectance characteristics of the object before the thin layer was deposited.

Multi-material scanning for additive fabrication

A method and an apparatus are directed to characterizing a continuously moving 3D object via interferometry-based scanning. The method includes repeatedly forming several depth characterizations of the 3D object along respective scan lines of a plurality of scan lines on the surface of the 3D object. During this scanning, the 3D object is undergoing its continuous motion. The method further includes combining the determined depth characterization along the scan lines of the plurality of scan lines to form a depth map representing at least a depth of a portion associated with a location on the surface of the 3D object in the third direction on a grid of locations arranged in the first and second directions. Forming the depth characterizations includes scanning a frequency-dispersed pulsed optical signal in a first direction across the continuously moving 3D object, said 3D object moving in a second direction substantially orthogonal to the first direction. The scanned optical signal forming scan lines on a surface of the 3D object in a third direction substantially orthogonal to the first direction and the second direction.

High-speed metrology

Systems and methods are provided for determining a velocity or an inflation rate of a droplet in a microfluidic channel. The droplet is exposed to two or more temporally separated flashes of light, each flash including light of one wavelength band, and imaged using a detector configured to distinguish light in the wavelength bands. Two or more images of the droplet are acquired, each corresponding to one of the flashes, and all within a single video frame or photographic exposure. The images can be processed separately and the position or size of the droplet in each image is calculated. A velocity or inflation rate is then determined by dividing the change in position or size by the amount of time allowed to pass between the flashes.

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Arlington, MA, United States of America

Aaron Weber