TECHNOLOGY LICENSING OPPORTUNITY: Engineered Porous Print Materials

Engineered Porous Print Materials enables manufacturers to produce complex, high-surface-area structures with precisely engineered porosity at macro, micro and nano scales — all from a single printable composition and a standard stereolithography printer. By eliminating the need for secondary coatings, multi-step mold processes or specialized equipment, this technology developed by Los Alamos National Laboratory simplifies the production of advanced porous materials while opening design possibilities that conventional fabrication methods cannot achieve. Organizations seeking to improve the performance of catalytic reactors, filtration systems, thermal management devices, energy storage components or biomedical scaffolds, to name a few, can now access a versatile, low-cost platform that translates digital designs directly into functional, multi-material foam structures with tunable chemistry and architecture.

How it Works

The process begins with a specially formulated resin that contains three key ingredients mixed together: a polymer precursor that can be hardened by light, a porogenic solvent that induces phase separation during hardening, and a structural precursor (such as a metal salt or ceramic precursor) that will ultimately form the skeleton of the final part. When loaded into a commercial SLA 3D printer, the resin is cured layer by layer using light, producing a printed intermediate structure composed of a nanoporous polymer gel with the structural precursor distributed uniformly throughout. Post-printing processing — which may include controlled heating, chemical reduction or catalytic treatments depending on the target material — converts the structural precursor into the desired solid (metal, ceramic or carbon) while decomposing and removing the polymer gel. The spaces formerly occupied by the polymer gel become a second, finer tier of porosity nested inside the larger pores defined by the printed geometry, and additional processing steps such as de-alloying can introduce a third, nanoscale tier of porosity. The entire workflow uses a single resin formulation with no need to add coatings or secondary materials after printing.

Technical Description

The printable composition is engineered so that the polymer precursor component (typically an acrylate monomer such as polyethylene glycol diacrylate) undergoes photopolymerization in the presence of a porogenic solvent (such as dimethylformamide or water) that is deliberately chosen for its low compatibility with the resulting polymer network. During curing, the polymer phase-separates from the solvent, creating a sponge-like gel with pore sizes and volumes that can be tuned by adjusting the solvent-to-monomer ratio, solvent chemistry and the inclusion of structure-directing additives. A photoinitiator and a polymerization quenching compound (an absorber dye) are included to control layer thickness and prevent unwanted curing beyond the intended print pattern. The structural precursor — which can be a dissolved metal salt, a pre-ceramic alkoxide, a carbonaceous precursor or a pre-metal oxide — is homogeneously incorporated within the gel phase during printing, enabling an “inside-out” assembly of the final material, or could be absorbed through wicking into the porous, spongelike material before post processing.

After printing, downstream thermal and chemical treatments convert the structural precursor into the target material and remove the polymer template. For metal-based products, heating reduces metal ions to colloidal particles within the gel; further sintering fuses those particles into a continuous metallic skeleton while the polymer decomposes, leaving behind a free-standing porous metal replica of the original printed geometry. Isotropic shrinkage during polymer removal can reduce feature sizes well below the printer's native resolution, enabling structural details that conventional SLA cannot achieve on its own. Demonstrated material systems include silver, gold (with trimodal porosity achieved through silver-gold de-alloying), silica, boron carbide, copper, iron and cobalt oxide. Pore diameters span from greater than one millimeter at the macro scale down to below 100 nanometers at the nano scale, and all pore networks remain interconnected and accessible throughout the bulk of the part.

Advantages

• Single-resin workflow instead of multiple coating steps
• Multi-scale porosity in one printed part
• Works across several material types
• Compatible with standard stereolithography equipment
• Internal pores stay connected and accessible
• Pore size and density can be adjusted through formulation and processing

Market Applications

• Catalysis (reactor supports, flow-through catalyst bodies)
• Energy Storage (battery electrodes, capacitor structures)
• Thermal Management (heat exchangers, heat pipe wicks, cooling components)
• Filtration and Separations (fluid filters, gas scrubbers, purification media)
• Biomedical (bone scaffolds, culture substrates)
• Lightweight Structures (reinforcement, insulation, fire protection parts)

U.S. Patent Nos. 11,267,920; 12,054,569; pending

LA-UR-26-23577

TRL 4

LANL Tech Partnerships: Unlock the Innovative Potential

Los Alamos National Laboratory offers a wide range of cutting-edge technologies and capabilities that may provide your company with a competitive edge in the market and unlock the innovative potential that can enhance, refine, and revolutionize your products.

LANL’s licensing program focuses on moving inventions developed by our researchers to commercial innovations. Patented and patent pending inventions and copyrighted software are available to existing and start-up companies through exclusive and non-exclusive licensing agreements. For specific discussions, please contact licensing@lanl.gov.

Note: This is not a call for external services for the development of this technology.

https://www.lanl.gov/engage/collaboration/feynman-center/partner-with-us/licensing-technology

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