Metal and plastic 3D printers are additive manufacturing devices that create objects layer by layer, but they differ in materials and processes. Metal 3D printers employ technologies like Direct Metal Laser Sintering (DMLS) or Selective Laser Melting (SLM) where metal powders (such as aluminum, titanium, or stainless steel) are selectively fused together using a high-powered laser. The laser precisely melts and binds the metal particles according to the design, layer upon layer, forming durable and intricate metal parts. These printers are utilized in industries like aerospace, automotive, and healthcare for producing high-strength, complex metal components with exceptional precision and mechanical properties.
On the other hand, plastic 3D printers, also known as Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) or Stereolithography (SLA) printers, use thermoplastics or photopolymer resins to construct objects. FDM printers heat and extrude thermoplastic filaments layer by layer, creating the desired shape. SLA printers use UV lasers to cure liquid resin into solid layers, producing detailed and smooth plastic parts. These plastic 3D printers are widely used in various fields, including prototyping, consumer goods, and medical devices, offering versatility and cost-effectiveness in producing customized or small-scale parts.
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1. 3D Printed Ion-Chelating Architectures for Electrochemical Wastewater Valorization into Flexible Electronics and Metal Recycling
Published: 2026 | Additive Manufacturing, 122, 105210
Authors: Kewei Song, Yannan Li, Chaolun Xu, Shinjiro Umezu, Hirotaka Sato
3D-printed ion-chelating architectures capture and recover metal ions from electroplating/industrial wastewater electrochemically, converting a pollution problem into a resource-recovery process. The recovered metal is directly incorporated into the printed structure to yield flexible electronic components, unifying wastewater treatment, metal recycling, and functional device fabrication in a single additive-manufacturing workflow.
2. Leveraging Multi-Material Ceramic Additive Manufacturing and Intrinsic Material-Based Catalyst Metallization to Realize Robust and Damage-Free 3D Ceramic Electronics
Published: 2026 | Materials Today, 93, 103202
Authors: Kewei Song, Ze Zhang, Zifu Fan, Yifan Pan, Weiyang Wan, Yannan Li, Shinjiro Umezu, Hirotaka Sato
Combines multi-material ceramic additive manufacturing with a catalyst-metallization approach intrinsic to the ceramic material itself, eliminating damage-prone post-processing steps to produce robust, damage-free 3D ceramic electronic structures.
3. Multi-Material 4D Printing and 3D Patterned Metallization Enables Smart Architectures
Published: February 1, 2025 | Composites Part B: Engineering, 295, 112218
Authors: Kewei Song, Chunfeng Xiong, Ze Zhang, Kunlin Wu, Weiyang Wan, Yifan Wang, Shinjiro Umezu, Hirotaka Sato
Develops thermoplastic shape-memory-polymer/metal (TSMP/M) heterogeneous interfaces via multi-material DLP 3D printing combined with selective electroless-plating metallization, enabling 3D-programmable selective metallization on complex shape-memory structures. The resulting heterointerfaces can be driven at low voltage to perform robot-like tasks, opening design space for embedded, remote, and low-power 4D-printed smart devices.
4. Metal-Plastic Hybrid Additive Manufacturing to Realize Small-Scale Self-Propelled Catalytic Engines
Published: 2024 | ACS Omega, 9(1), 283-293
Authors: Adhikarige Taniya Kaushalya Perera, Kewei Song, Xiangyi Meng, Weiyang Wan, Shinjiro Umezu, Hirotaka Sato
Uses metal-plastic hybrid additive manufacturing to fabricate small-scale, self-propelled catalytic “micro-engine” structures, extending the group’s electroless-plating-based metallization technique toward autonomous micro-robotic and catalytic propulsion applications.
5. New Metal–Plastic Hybrid Additive Manufacturing for Precise Fabrication of Arbitrary Metal Patterns on External and Even Internal Surfaces of 3D Plastic Structures
Published: 2022 | ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, 14(41), 46896-46911 (arXiv precursor submitted December 22, 2021, arXiv:2112.11661)
Authors: Kewei Song, Yue Cui, Tiannan Tao, Xiangyi Meng, Michinari Sone, Masahiro Yoshino, Shinjiro Umezu, Hirotaka Sato
A modified light-cured resin serves as an active precursor for electroless plating, and a newly developed multi-material DLP 3D printer fabricates parts combining standard resin and active-precursor regions nested within each other. Selective electroless plating then produces complex metal-plastic composite structures with hollow internal features down to 40 μm resolution — including functional demonstrations like a nickel-plated LED stereo circuit and a double-sided copper 3D circuit.
6. Recent Progress in Functionalized Plastic 3D Printing in Creation of Metallized Architectures
Published: 2023 | Materials & Design, 232, 112044
Authors: Adhikarige Taniya Kaushalya Perera, Kewei Song, Shinjiro Umezu, Hirotaka Sato
Review article summarizing the group’s and the field’s progress in functionalized plastic 3D printing combined with metallization techniques for producing metal-plastic hybrid architectures, covering process strategies, material systems, and application areas.
7. Modified Polymer 3D Printing Enables the Formation of Functionalized Micro-Metallic Architectures
Published: 2023 | Additive Manufacturing, 61, 103317
Authors: Adhikarige Taniya Kaushalya Perera, Kunlin Wu, Weiyang Wan, Kewei Song, Xiangyi Meng, Shinjiro Umezu, Yifan Wang, Hirotaka Sato
Modifies standard polymer 3D printing processes/resins to enable the formation of functionalized micro-scale metallic architectures, broadening the design space for metal-plastic hybrid microstructures beyond the group’s earlier DLP-based approach.
8. Best of Both Worlds: A Novel, Environment-Friendly Approach to 3D Printing Metal–Plastic Hybrid Structures
Published: 2021 | Reinforced Plastics, 65(1), 53-55
Authors: Shinjiro Umezu, Hirotaka Sato
Short review/perspective piece summarizing the group’s environmentally-friendly metal-plastic hybrid 3D printing approach — combining plastic additive manufacturing with electroless plating rather than energy-intensive direct metal printing — for a materials-industry trade audience.
9. Metal-Plastic Hybrid 3D Printing Using Catalyst-Loaded Filament and Electroless Plating
Published: 2020 | Additive Manufacturing, 36, 101556
Authors: Jing Zhan, Toshiyuki Tamura, Xiang Li, Zhao Ma, Michinari Sone, Masahiro Yoshino, Shinjiro Umezu, Hirotaka Sato
Foundational paper establishing the group’s core metal-plastic hybrid 3D printing method: a catalyst-loaded FDM filament is printed into the desired plastic geometry, then selectively activated regions undergo electroless plating to deposit metal — the base technique later extended to DLP printing, ceramics, and multi-material 4D structures in the group’s subsequent work.