A miniature chair and desk 3D printed from waste woodThakur et al., Sci. Adv. 10, eadk3250 (2024)
Recycled wooden could be was an ink for 3D printing, which may supply a extra sustainable approach to manufacture furnishings and even construct homes.
“Wooden has been used for constructing and structural functions for hundreds of years,” says Muhammad Rahman at Rice College in Texas. However working with the fabric isn’t particularly environment friendly, as chiselling it all the way down to measurement may end up in a number of waste.

To utilize this leftover materials, Rahman and his colleagues break up it into lignin and cellulose – molecules which are key to the stiff construction of wooden – and these had been damaged all the way down to type nanofibres and nanocrystals. They then recombined the cellulose and lignin with water to make a clay-like substance that may very well be used as an ink.
The researchers used this substance to 3D print objects by forcing it by way of a nozzle and build up layers of ink.
To spice up the power of the 3D-printed objects, the staff freeze-dried them to take away moisture after which shortly heated them as much as 180°C (356°F) to make the lignin soften and fuse with the cellulose.
“We will really mimic all of the visible, textural and olfactory properties of pure wooden,” says Rahman. The product was discovered to be practically six occasions extra sturdy than pure balsa wooden in compression checks, and as much as 3 times as versatile in bending checks.
Thus far, the researchers have managed to create miniature furnishings and honeycomb constructions utilizing the ink, however they hope it may ultimately be used to construct bigger objects, akin to homes.
“We have to rethink how we are able to make constructions with out slicing down timber,” says Rahman. “If we are able to recycle waste wooden utilizing 3D printing as a substitute of typical manufacturing, that may be an excellent step ahead.”

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