Alaa Elwany Shares his Insights on AM and the DOE
Politicians might be great at campaigning and disparaging their counterparts on the other side of the aisle, but for the most part they need technical experts to advise them on the science, engineering, and technology that keep our great country moving forward. Alaa Elwany is one of those experts, which is why the United States Department of Energy (DOE) selected him for a multi-year stint with its newly formed Advanced Materials and Manufacturing Technologies Office (AMMTO). With more than two decades in industry and academia—most recently as an associate professor at Texas A&M University in College Station, which is consistently ranked among the nation’s top public undergraduate and graduate programs—Elwany is well qualified to help guide decisions at different levels of government.
Manufacturing Engineering (ME) Contributing Editor Kip Hanson had a chance to speak with Elwany recently about his role as a fellow within DOE and gather his thoughts on the past, present, and future of additive manufacturing (AM). Here’s what he had to say:
ME: What does a DOE Science and Technology Fellow do all day?
Elwany: I’m participating in a federal fellowship program that competitively recruits technical experts from industry and academia to come and spend one or two years with the federal government and engage in policymaking. Serving my term at DOE AMMTO, the programs we’re working on advance energy-related materials and manufacturing technologies to increase domestic competitiveness and build a clean, decarbonized U.S. economy.
But we also support the White House in setting the nation’s advanced manufacturing priorities in a “whole-of-government” approach. For instance, the administration has an Office of Science and Technology Policy that advises the president on different matters related to the effects of science and technology on domestic and international affairs. I recently participated in a team that includes other fellows and civil servants who are helping develop the government’s four-year plan to retain U.S. global leadership in advanced manufacturing.
ME: How does 3D printing fit into all that?
Elwany: In my role as fellow at the government, the focus is advanced manufacturing, a broad term that includes additive manufacturing but also other technologies like next-generation materials, biomanufacturing, semiconductors, hydrogen fuel cells and so on. That said, I’m also still a faculty member at Texas A&M during my government detail, and there we do extensive research into laser-powder-bed fusion (LPBF) and directed-energy deposition (DED), as well as binder jetting and even extrusion-based metal additive manufacturing processes.
ME: You mentioned semiconductors. Were you involved in the CHIPS Act?
Elwany: Not in my current role, but before joining the DOE last September, I spent one year as a fellow at NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology), where I was heavily involved in planning activities and programs to be established as part of the CHIPS Act. It had already passed Congress at that point and we were waiting on the appropriations to go through, so it was an excellent time to be engaged with them, seeing as they are leading the lion’s share of the activity in this critical area.
ME: I assume advanced manufacturing also means smart manufacturing? If so, what are you seeing in terms of artificial intelligence (A.I.), machine learning (ML), and the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT)?
Elwany: Smart manufacturing is certainly a subset of advanced manufacturing. It involves merging advanced new information and communications technologies (ICT) with the manufacturing environment to achieve real-time management of energy, production, and costs. Whether we’re talking about large organizations like General Electric or General Motors, or the job shop down the street, they all have manufacturing systems and processes that generate very large streams of data, the majority of which goes unused—assuming they’re collecting it at all, it’s sitting there on the servers and no one is doing anything with it.
Technologies like A.I. and ML can help manufacturers identify trends and patterns that a human might overlook, guiding them to make decisions that improve efficiency and reduce costs. From an additive perspective, one example would be to use A.I. to analyze data captured through onboard sensors to detect, and ultimately mitigate, defects during laser-powder-bed fusion in real time, rather than spending large sums of money after the fact to inspect the parts using technologies like computerized tomography.
ME: Some 3D-printer builders and their customers might be nervous about letting A.I. make critical decisions or make changes to the manufacturing process. What do you say to them?
Elwany: It’s understandable that people are concerned over the possibility of A.I.-enabled robots that think on their own, but we’re not there yet and that’s a discussion for another day. But when we talk about A.I. and ML in the context of advanced manufacturing, it’s important to remember that—at this point, anyway—these are essentially glorified smart data analytics tools that help us make better use of data for improved process control, as well as the design of new products or materials. For example, we’re working with NASA on a project that uses machine learning to design and 3D print a new class of refractory alloys for harsh operating conditions. So yes, I see huge potential for these tools, both now and in the future.
ME: It’s one thing to develop a new material, but quite another to 3D print and then qualify it. Does A.I. help here as well?
Elwany: In many ways. Let’s say you want to print the refractory metal I just mentioned, or really any alloy that is new to AM. What laser power will you use? How about the spot size? How fast should you traverse? What layer thickness is best, and what scan pattern will provide the highest quality part?
There are dozens and sometimes hundreds of parameters you need to consider, and, once done, you might need to perform hundreds or even thousands of experiments until you reach the perfect recipe. But we can do much of this systematically using machine learning and other tools to the point that we can achieve results in a week instead of a few months.
Secondly, A.I. helps accelerate the qualification and certification process, ensuring that the part meets requirements and exhibits less variability. And, finally, there’s additive manufacturing of smart materials, which can change form or function when subjected to external stimuli such as temperature or pressure.
ME: What about smart materials? Is there potential to 3D print them?
Elwany: Smart materials are a class of materials that can change form or function when subjected to external stimuli such as temperature or pressure. At Texas A&M, our group has done extensive work in the 3D printing of shape memory alloys characterized by the above, but we took it one step further.
By modulating the laser parameters during the build, we generate different thermal cycles in one location versus another. This changes the microstructure in certain areas and therefore the behavior of the metal in response to different conditions—you might use it to manufacture a cardiovascular stent that reacts based on the patient’s blood pressure, for instance, or other types of smart medical implant. I like to call this “four-and-a-half-D” printing.
ME: As you know, the industry suffers from a chronic shortage of skilled workers. How will this affect the growth and future adoption of additive manufacturing?
Elwany: The skilled technicians of today might be good with CNC machines and other forms of traditional manufacturing, but they need to learn new technologies as well. As such, I’m a strong believer in preparing them for these future responsibilities, so I engage in a lot of workforce development activities.
Through a partnership with EOS (a major global manufacturer of 3D printers), Texas A&M offers professional workforce development certificates. As a professor at the university, I can tell you that we’re seeing a great deal of interest in AM and advanced manufacturing overall. I offered the first dedicated 3D-printing course on campus a few years ago and continue to see upwards of 80 students per semester, so student involvement has been overwhelmingly positive. I think that indicates a bright future for the industry.
ME: Aside from developing sound manufacturing policies, is the government taking other steps to support American manufacturing?
Elwany: Absolutely. They’ve been doing so for some time, but I think post-COVID, we as a country have finally come to the realization that we must strengthen the resilience of our supply chains through better and more coordinated relationships between government and industry. Neither can do it on their own. It’s only through public/private partnerships like Manufacturing USA, America Makes, and CESMII that we will continue to move forward, build our collective workforce, and enable new manufacturing technologies, additive among them.
And they’re working. Granted, there’s still a lot of work to do, but the National Science and Technology Council has prioritized AM as one of 13 technologies that it must continue to invest in—as proof, look at the AM Forward initiative the White House launched last year. From my side, I think we will continue leading in this area, because, frankly, we have the skills, the innovation capacity, and the intellectual capability.
