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UNM Patents Ultra-Ductile 3D Concrete for Construction Innovation

3D Printing

Maryam Hojati, 3D concrete printing, UNM

Business Honor
16 January, 2025

UNM researchers patent ultra-ductile 3D concrete material, revolutionizing construction and space exploration.

The research group from the University of New Mexico (UNM), headed by Assistant Professor Maryam Hojati, has come up with a breakthrough development in 3D concrete printing. A new patented material is designed: self-reinforced ultra-ductile cementitious material. This provides an easy answer to all common problems experienced while printing concrete structures using the 3D method. It is brittle in tension and susceptible to cracks and fractures, particularly when affected by a natural disaster or some stressing event like an earthquake. The new material intends to correct this weakness, suggesting more elastic, able concrete that can 3D print without needing such traditional reinforcements as steel bars.

This material is unique because it self-reinforces through short polymeric fibers, and the concrete will bend and stretch without breaking. The material has been designed to pass through nozzles for 3D printing without sticking, and its fiber content has been balanced perfectly with viscosity. This innovation addresses the problem of reinforcement but opens up the possibilities for more automated and efficient construction processes. Such samples underwent rigorous tests, verifying its flexibility and strength and showed as much as 11.9% higher strain capacity than normal concrete.

This research, funded by the Transportation Consortium of South-Central States (Tran-SET), may change the face of the construction industry with more durable infrastructure that requires less maintenance and faster, more automated building methods. Furthermore, the development has huge potential for space exploration, where traditional construction materials and methods are impractical. One day, 3D printing may allow astronauts to construct buildings on other planets using locally sourced materials.

This ultra-ductile material that is patented to date is envisioned to be instrumental in the next stages of the future of Earth's construction as well as extra-terrestrial.