SME Awards Honor Additive Manufacturing Innovation, Skill and Leadership

SME announced the winners of its Additive Manufacturing Community Awards, which were presented during the RAPID + TCT 2021 additive manufacturing (AM) event, which is taking place Sept. 13-15 at Chicago’s McCormick Place.

The awards were presented by SME’s AM Technical Community Leadership Committee and Direct Digital Manufacturing Advisory Team, which produce content for the organization’s programs and other industry events on advanced AM technologies and processes that allow the development, testing and manufacture of new products faster and more cost-effectively. The Additive Manufacturing Industry Awards celebrate the accomplishments of individuals, teams and companies creating impact in commercializing AM.

SME’s AM Technical Community Leadership Committee pre-dates the formation of RAPID + TCT. It originally was created in 1992 by the Rapid Prototyping Association (RPA), which joined the Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME) one year later to become the Rapid Prototyping Association of SME (RPA/SME). It later was renamed SME’s Rapid Technologies & Additive Manufacturing Community Advisors before eventually becoming what it is today. Its charge has always been to advise the organization on initiatives, activities, policy and strategy related to AM.

Because of this mantra, all three of the awards, which traditionally are presented at RAPID + TCT, are focused on the application of AM technology to production, not just research and development. This year’s Additive Manufacturing Community awards include the following:

AM Industry Achievement Award

The AM Industry Achievement Award, established in 2008, was developed to recognize an individual or team for outstanding accomplishments that have had significant impact in the application of AM in any industry. The award recognizes achievements that have been implemented or deployed in a commercial/industrial environment rather than research investigative work. Winners are selected with consideration for the scope and scale of benefits realized and the potential future impact their work will have on the industry. The recipient is:

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  David K. Leigh, Ph.D., chief technology officer for Additive Manufacturing, 3D Systems

Leigh is recognized for his career-long contributions to the AM industry. He has been instrumental in pioneering standards and specifications on qualification of AM; building successful culture and systems at printing service houses; and founding (and eventually spinning off) companies that broadened the market and audience for AM technology.

Aubin AM Case Study Award

The newly rebranded and updated “Aubin AM Case Study Award” looks to recognize innovations in application of AM technologies. The purpose of the award is to recognize use cases of AM adoption and implementation and to provide inspiration to others in their journey of AM application. The recipients include:

• B. Dutta,¹ M. Lewan,¹ V. Singh,¹ R. Fortuna,¹ F. Ghadamli,¹ P. Gradl,² R. Hickman,² J. Fikes,² M. Ogles,³ K. Wheeler,⁴ V. Hafiychuk,⁴ H. Hafiychuk⁴
• “Rapid Large Scale Additive Manufacturing of Full-scale RS-25 Engine Nozzle Liner”  
• ¹DM3D Technology, ²NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, ³National Center for Additive Manufacturing Excellence (NCAME)-Auburn University, ⁴NASA Ames Research Center

Digital Manufacturing Challenge

The 2021 Digital Manufacturing Challenge is a call for action to inspire the next generation of engineers. They are challenged to rethink ways to design, create and use infrastructure-level systems that deploy engineering design and manufacturing solutions to strengthen infrastructure in the response, mitigation and/or prevention of disruptive events and envision a view of robust, sustainable, smart, agile communities. The recipients are:

• Sagar Patel and Martine McGregor, “Rapid Deployment of Patient-Specific Prosthesis Assemblies in Emergency Medicine,” University of Waterloo
• Faculty Advisors: Mihaela Vlasea, Stewart McLachlin, University of Waterloo

For more information about the history of SME’s AM Technical Community, read “SME’s Additive Manufacturing Community Celebrates Over 30 Years of Activity,” by Zach Simkin, past chair of SME’s Additive Manufacturing Community Advisory Board.

Sources: Press materials received from the company and additional information gleaned from the company’s website.