Manufacturers have improved their embedded 3D printing methods over the last 5-years. Yet, one limitation remains that no one has managed to eliminate – the ability quickly print ultra-thin structures, like those found in nature. Due to their microscopic characteristics, these structures can be built incredibly strong and resilient, making them ideal for today’s high-performance applications.
Fortunately, an innovative team of researchers may have unlocked a new 3D printing method that mimics nature, opening the door for a range of new uses, potentially including creating embedded semiconductors. Here’s what you need to know.
Mimic Nature
Nature has many uses for thin fibrous structures like hairs or the thin blood vessels that allow your muscles to receive oxygen through your bloodstream. For some animals, these thin hairs can act as sensors in the form of whiskers. In other species, like spiders, they can be used as a trap or a way to build a home.
Lizards and many other animals use hair-like features to scale vertical walls. There are even cases where thin hair-like structures are used as a defense mechanism. The hagfish will eject a fibrous gel onto predators that cover their gills and eyes, essentially choking and blinding any would-be predator.
Engineers have long wanted to replicate many of these natural occurrences, but limitations in today’s manufacturing processes have made it impossible. Recent advancements in high-resolution embedded 3D printing technology helped to solve some of the issues but many remain. Now, a new method of 3D printing promises to provide the missing pieces of the puzzle, enabling a new wave of ultra-fine design structures.
Traditional 3D-Printing Methods
Traditional 3D printing utilizes a nozzle and solvent that gets extruded layer by layer in an open-air environment. The material is then dried using time, heat, or even lasers. Recent advancements have helped traditional 3D printing gain the ability to produce thinner extrudes, but there is much lacking in terms of duplicating nature.
Drawbacks
The main drawbacks of traditional 3D printing methods include problems such as the overall orientation of the print. The print must sit in a way that each layer can support the following layer. In many instances, support structures need to be added and removed after the print dries, adding to the overall workload and time.
The thinness of the fine hair-like prints engineers seek to create has proven to be impossible to reproduce in the open air. The structural integrity, gravity, and other forces cause the micro-thin supports to buckle. One solution is to print into a substance rather than air.
Embedded 3D Printing
Embedded 3D printing utilizes another medium that helps to provide support for the structure as it cures and hardens. Embedded printing systems can use hydrogels that enable the printing nozzle to move freely but hold the print in place as it dries. This approach does solve the issues related to gravity-induced deformation of printed structures during direct ink writing.
Embedded 3D printing has some additional advantages. For one, the hydrogel mixture is reusable, meaning that printers don’t need to purchase more for each print. They can also use a variety of different filaments to create complex structures since the process provides support during the curing process.
Embedded 3D Printing Drawbacks
This embedded 3D printing method has proven to be more effective at printing certain designs and thinner extrudes, like helical springs. However, its ability to print nature-like fibers remains limited by filament break-up due to capillarity. Testing shows anything below a sixteen-micron diameter remains out of the range of current embedded 3D printing methods due to filament breakage from surface tension.
Embedded 3D Printing Study
Inspired by nature, a group of engineers from Dankook University in South Korea and others introduced a new method of embedded 3D printing that takes cues from mother nature. This bio-inspired approach was published in the journal Nature Communications as the study “Fast 3D printing of fine, continuous, and soft fibers via embedded solvent exchange.” It delves into a rapid printing, multi-nozzle, process called 3DPX (3D printing by solvent exchange).
Non-Newtonian Gel
The 3DPX method combines the use of non-Newtonian gels with a new printer design to print micron-thin filamentous structures. Notably, the gel utilizes solvent exchange to inhibit capillary breakup from surface tension. As such, it allows the print nozzle to move freely due to its added torque, but the thin fibers see the gel as a solid, providing needed support.
3D Printing Mimics Nature
Additionally, the gel provided superior mechanical performance thanks to the use of micron-scale thread bundles. Reducing limitations due to the interfacial surface roughness of the microgel particles.
Instant Curing
The engineers created the gel with a mixture of solvents that would make the ink solidify as soon as it came into contact with it. The instant curing helped the printing process support intricate super-thin structures that would have been impossible using previous methods and materials.
Embedded 3D Printing Test
To test their theory, the team created a custom-built 3D printer. The device integrated a precision motion stage system, dispensing system, and control computer, similar to most units found commercially. The main difference is that it prints within a support gel with viscoplastic yield-stress fluid rheology.
Notably, the team tested 7 different inks to find the best option. The selection included a range of materials from thermoplastic elastomers to polystyrene and PVC. Additional testing reviews the use of styrene ethylene butylene styrene block copolymer, SEBS, and toluene as the solvent option.
Embedded 3D Printing Results
The test results showcased impressive capabilities. They found that the solvent exchange between the extruded ink facilitated rapid solidification, supporting more intricate and complex prints. The team’s printer was able to achieve an inner diameter on prints of 5 µm using a glass nozzle. The same device achieved a thinness resolution of 1.5 microns while following free-form trajectories.
Embedded 3D Printing Benefits
The ability to print structures using soft materials with a diameter as small as one micron opens the door for a material science revolution. Materials and structures that leverage thin hairlike structures can provide a new level of structural integrity.
Faster
This method of embedded 3D printing is faster than traditional methods due to the instant curing feature. Specifically, the team recorded the solidification of the extruded polymer filament at a rate of 2.33 μm/s. Impressively, this data registers at 500,000 times faster than competing methods.
Rapid Manufacturing
Also, the ability to print through multiple nozzles in parallel opens the door for large-scale manufacturing applications. Multiple nozzles can be set up to print like an assembly line or to create a complex structure. These structures can integrate different materials. As such, they can print electrical circuits, switches, and much more.
Flexibility
The research shows that 3DPX can support a wide range of materials including several commercially available polymers, solvents, and non-solvent components. This flexibility makes this process easier to integrate into the current manufacturing processes.
What Embedded 3D Printing tech means for Semiconductors
This latest approach would allow engineers to create fully active 3D-printed semiconductors leveraging recent breakthroughs such as fully 3D-printed resettable fuses. This technological breakthrough could have a resounding effect on the semiconductor industry. Finally allowing scientists to make manufacturing these devices more affordable, efficient, and capable.
Embedded 3D Printing Researchers
Dr. Wonsik Eom from the Department of Fiber Convergence Material Engineering at Dankook University in South Korea worked alongside a team of engineers including MechSE Professors Sameh Tawfick and Randy Ewoldt to bring this new 3D printing study to the public. In the future, they plan to expand testing to examine even more materials and gels.
Companies Leading the Embedded 3D Printing Industry
Additive manufacturing has come a long way over the last decade. Today, multiple types of printing methods range from creating composite materials for spacecraft, all the way to printing human organs and everything in between. Here’s one company that is poised to maximize any 3D printing advancements.
The Belgium-based 3D printing software and manufacturing firm, Materialise (MTLS -1.13%) remains a pioneering spirit in the market. It was founded by Wilfried Vancraen and Hilde Ingelaere in 1990 to offer fast prototyping options to manufacturers. Impressively, this firm introduced several firsts over the last 3 decades.
Materialise NV (MTLS -1.13%)
Today, Materialise’s 3D printing software is popular among manufacturers due to its use of modules. Specifically, there are modules for lattice creation and part nesting. These options help developers create lighter and stronger designs and could be ideal in the creation of micron-thin structures.
Materialise has product offerings across multiple industries ranging from the medical sector to industrial use cases. It’s recognized as one of the leading 3D printing stock options for traders. As such, it could be a smart addition to the portfolio of those seeking a reputable 3D printing stock that has decades of experience.
Embedded 3D Printing – Faster and Lighter Computers
There are so many uses for ultra-thin 3D patterned structures. When you examine the desire of hardware developers to be able to print entire chips in a single process, the research done by this team will prove to be a valuable resource moving forward. For one, this research opens the door for many breakthroughs across material science and other fields.
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Study Reference:
1. Eom, W., Hossain, M. T., Parasramka, V., Kim, J., Siu, R. W. Y., Sanders, K. A., Piorkowski, D., Lowe, A., Koh, H. G., De Volder, M. F. L., Fudge, D. S., Ewoldt, R. H., & Tawfick, S. H. (2025). Fast 3D printing of fine, continuous, and soft fibers via embedded solvent exchange. Nature Communications, 16, 842. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-55972-1