MIT researchers have developed a new robotic system that can 3-D print the basic structure of a building, writes Michelle Starr for CBS News. Starr explains that the system is “free moving, can be customized to print on any suitable surface and is intended to be self-sufficient.”
Don Reisinger writes for Fortune that MIT researchers have developed a robot that can 3-D print a free-standing structure in 14 hours. The researchers hope the robot, which consists of two robotic arms attached to a vehicle, can be used to construct buildings in “disparate parts of the world or even on other planets,” explains Reisinger.
MIT researchers have developed a robot that can 3-D print the basic structure of buildings, writes Matthew Hutson for Science. The autonomous robot sprays an expanding foam into the desired shape “to build up a hollow wall that serves as insulation and can later be filled with concrete and covered in plaster,” explains Hutson.
CBC News reporter Matthew Braga writes that MIT researchers have designed a system that can 3-D print the basic structure of buildings. The researchers believe the system could one day be used to “build structures in extreme or inhospitable environments — say, the aftermath of an earthquake, or even on another planet.”
Researchers from the Self-Assembly Lab have developed a method of 3-D printing that creates large objects, such as furniture, in minutes, reports Alex Knapp for Forbes. "Our process does not print with layers, does not need support materials, can be printed in seconds to minutes and uses everyday industrial liquid materials," explains Prof. Skylar Tibbits.
In this video, WCVB Chronicle host Anthony Everett visits Prof. Neil Gershenfeld at the Center for Bits and Atoms to learn about the global network of Fab Labs. Everett explains that Gershenfeld sees Fab Labs as places of “collaboration and networking and mentoring where ideas can literally take form. Where you don’t borrow, but make what you want.”
In this video, TechCrunch explores how MIT researchers are designing new techniques to make it easier for robots to grasp and manipulate objects. Graduate student Nikhil Chavan-Dafle explains that he and his colleagues developed a model that allows robots to “predict how an object is going to move in the grasp.”
Writing for The Boston Globe, Elisabeth Reynolds, executive director of the Industrial Performance Center, suggests that advanced manufacturing could create new job opportunities in the U.S. Reynolds notes that “advanced manufacturing, which combines new information technology with advanced machinery, is reinvigorating manufacturing and creating opportunities in the United States that did not seem feasible just over a decade ago.”
In a Huffington Post article, Prof. David Autor lists the pressing long-and short-term issues that economists will focus on in 2017. Among the long-term concerns are the effects of artificial intelligence and machine learning, which could potentially disrupt “the value of products produced using manual labor in the developing world.”
MIT researchers have developed a new 3-D printing method that allows users to alter the printed object, writes Amelia Heathman for Wired. The new printing method enables users to “add polymers that alter the material's chemical composition and mechanical properties.”
Prof. Emanuel Sachs, who is credited as one of the inventors of 3-D printing, discusses the manufacturing method’s origins and its increasing popularity with Meghna Chakrabarti of Radio Boston. Sachs explains that 3-D printing is an increasingly popular academic tool because “it takes so long to make prototypes any other way and…3-D printing really enables people to make.”
Brian Anthony, director of MIT’s master of engineering in manufacturing program, speaks with Anna Louie Sussman of The Wall Street Journal about preparing workers for today’s manufacturing jobs. Anthony explains that his goal is to make the MIT manufacturing program a “template for then making sector-specific degree programs.”
A study co-authored by Prof. Paul Osterman found that the demand for higher-level skills in U.S. manufacturing jobs is modest, writes Erik Sherman from Forbes. Sherman writes that the skills gap the researchers measured “existed at 16 percent to 25 percent of manufacturing companies.”
Oscar Williams writes for The Huffington Post about a new prototype for a glasses-free, 3-D movie screen developed by CSAIL researchers. The prototype "harnesses a blend of lenses and mirrors to enable viewers to watch the film from any seat in the house.”
In this CBS News article, Michelle Star writes that CSAIL researchers have developed a method that allows moviegoers to see 3-D movies without wearing glasses. Star notes that the prototype “has been demonstrated in an auditorium, where all viewers saw 3-D images of a consistently high resolution.”