Current technologies for additive manufacturing (3D printing) are mostly developed for on-earth environment which relies on the gravitational force, and any vibration/disturbance must be minimized. However, in many situations, e.g., on space missions where gravity is close to zero, while on air/sea missions (on-board of aeroplanes/ships) where random vibration is unavoidable, it is hard to use liquid/powder form of raw materials in 3D printing. Even for volumetric additive manufacturing via tomographic reconstruction, good accuracy in cross-linking of polymeric liquid is a challenge, if the printing platform is unstable (such as, on air/sea missions).

Here, we propose a novel technology for rapid volumetric additive manufacturing from one single piece of solid (instead of powder/liquid) polymer, in which cross-linking is carried out on the solid state and the un-cross-linked part can be easily removed later on.

Proof-of-concept has been successfully done and now we are on the way to commercialize this technology.