3D printing for microsatellites-material requirements and recent developments

Microsatellites for space applications are being intensively investigated in recent years. They can be used for diverse imaging and inspection applications in space, are relatively inexpensive and can be developed fast. Another rapidly emerging class of technologies is 3D printing which can be used to prepare nearly all shapes from diverse polymers, metals and other materials. The intersection between both techniques, however, is still small. Here we give an overview of the first approaches to perform 3D printing for microsatellites and similar space applications, of material requirements for such applications as well as properties of typical 3D printing materials, enabling suggestions for future experiments and pointing out challenges which have to be taken into account.