Eco-Friendly Robotic Additive Manufacturing

Our lab explores additive manufacturing techniques for on-site construction using locally sourced, eco-friendly materials. This allows reducing transportation needs and tailoring buildings to their environmental context. However, working with irregular natural materials poses challenges for digital fabrication. To address this, we develop robotic tools and workflows to handle earthen materials. Key focuses include:

• Creating mixtures optimized for printability and buildability
• Adapting fabrication to material behaviors
• Combining robotic deposition with manual assembly
• Developing design methods for multimode production

Projects

One project presented a workflow for linking site, material, simulation, and fabrication. This was used to test continuous, discrete, and multimode additive methods for reconstituting desert soil into architectural components. The multimode technique combined robotic printing of foundation layers with manual assembly of discrete elements. Another project focused on additive manufacturing using native lunar soil. A lunar analog site was modeled and strategies explored for groundscaping and 3D printing a habitat. This vision integrates robotic site preparation, printing of components, and astronaut assembly. The research indicates potential for extra-terrestrial construction relying on in situ resources.

Outcomes

Our techniques demonstrate the viability of additive manufacturing with irregular natural materials like soil and gravel. The tools and workflows aim to make adoption more accessible. Ongoing work is focused on automating material handling, developing sustainable binders, and coordinating multi-robot teams. Ultimately, we envision on-site digital fabrication that fully utilizes locally available resources. Combined with renewable energy, this approach can enable low-impact construction customized to local contexts. Our lab continues exploring the frontier of eco-friendly robotic additive manufacturing.