Inventor of Contour Crafting
Dr. Behrokh Khoshnevis is a Dean’s Professor at the University of Southern California and is the Director of the Center for Rapid Automated Fabrication Technologies (CRAFT) at USC. He is active in robotics and mechatronics related research and development projects that include the development of several novel Additive Manufacturing (3D Printing) processes such as Contour Crafting for mega-scale fabrication, SIS family of technologies for polymeric, metallic, and ceramic parts, and SSS for high temperature alloys and ceramics, as well as development of mechatronics systems for biomedical applications (e.g., digital dental prostheses fabrication, robotics for orthodontics, rehabilitation engineering, and tactile sensing devices), autonomous mobile and modular robots for fabrication and assembly on earth, in space and on other planets, and specialized innovative equipment for oil and gas industry.
He has numerous inventions and over 70 US and international patents and over 170 refereed technical publications. He is a National Academy of Inventors inductee, a Member of the European Union Academy of Sciences, and is a Fellow of the Society of Manufacturing Engineers, a Fellow of the Institute of Industrial & Systems Engineering, and a Fellow of the Society for Computer Simulation. He has won several awards including the Khwarizmi International Award (KIA Laureate), USC School of Engineering Senior Research award, Pete Lohman Best Engineering Alumni award, and Sharif University of Technology Alumni Award. Because of his Contour Crafting invention he received the 2014 Grand Prize among 1000+ globally competing technologies in the Create The Future design contest which was organized by NASA Tech Briefs Media Group and sponsored by HP, Intel and other major industries. Dr. Khoshnevis’ other 3D printing invention, Selective Separation Shaping (SSS) won another international competition grand prize by NASA in 2016 as the most capable and versatile metallic and ceramic Additive Manufacturing technology for zero-gravity and planetary applications.
Featured in
The Rise of Factory-built Housing: Episode 5
In 2012, six single-family homes were made by a 3D printer in China. The inventor of that technology is now working on a 3D printer designed to construct buildings on Mars. Does this technology have a future on Earth? Or does the future of homebuilding involve modern factories that leverage robots to build wood or steel framing similar to the types of machines you might find in modern automotive plants?
Images & videos courtesy of Behrokh Khoshnevis