History
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Several different 3D printing processes have been invented since the late 1970s. The printers were originally large, expensive and highly limited in what they could produce.
- Selective Laser Sintering (SLS) was developed and patented by Dr. Carl Deckard and Dr. Joseph Beaman at the University of Texas at Austin in the mid-1980s, under sponsorship of DARPA. A similar process was patented without being commercialized by R. F. Housholder in 1979.
- Stereolithography was patented in 1987 by Chuck Hull.
- Fused deposition modeling was developed by S. Scott Crump in the late 1980s and was commercialized in 1990 by Stratasys.
- The term "3D printing" was coined at MIT in 1995 when then graduate students Jim Bredt and Tim Anderson modified an inkjet printer to extrude a binding solution onto a bed of powder, rather than ink onto paper. The ensuing patent led to the creation of modern 3D printing companies Z Corporation (founded by Bredt and Anderson, and now owned by 3D Systems) and ExOne.
Read more about this topic: Direct Digital Manufacturing
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