Novel polymer materials systems to expand the capabilities of FDM™-type additive manufacturing

The work presented here describes the efforts conducted in the past decade by the Polymer Extrusion Lab at The University of Texas at El Paso in the area of novel materials development for fused deposition modeling (FDM™)-type additive manufacturing platforms. We discuss efforts in the development of application-specific materials systems as well as the development of materials whose physical properties can be enhanced by FDM™-type processing. Additional efforts in the area of hybrid composite materials, sustainable materials, and shape-memory polymers are discussed. Aspects related to materials characterization are also highlighted.