Designing bioinspired composite reinforcement architectures via 3D magnetic printing

Discontinuous fibre composites represent a class of materials that are strong, lightweight and have remarkable fracture toughness. These advantages partially explain the abundance and variety of discontinuous fibre composites that have evolved in the natural world. Many natural structures out-perform the conventional synthetic counterparts due, in part, to the more elaborate reinforcement architectures that occur in natural composites. Here we present an additive manufacturing approach that combines real-time colloidal assembly with existing additive manufacturing technologies to create highly programmable discontinuous fibre composites. This technology, termed as ‘3D magnetic printing’, has enabled us to recreate complex bioinspired reinforcement architectures that deliver enhanced material performance compared with monolithic structures. Further, we demonstrate that we can now design and evolve elaborate reinforcement architectures that are not found in nature, demonstrating a high level of possible customization in discontinuous fibre composites with arbitrary geometries. Superior mechanical properties in natural composites are frequently achieved by the inclusion of locally orientated reinforcing particles. Here, the authors implement this design strategy synthetically by employing a 3D magnetic printing protocol to create programmable composite architectures.