Biomimicry for 3D concrete printing: A review and perspective

Three-dimensional concrete printing (3DCP) is an exciting new manufacturing paradigm for the construction industry. As this technology continues to grow and develop, it is revealing clear signs of progress towards industrial application with various global successes including the manufacturing of pedestrian bridges, houses, office buildings, emergency shelters and military structures. Much of the current research in this field is unsurprisingly focussed on improving and refining the technology for improved strength, reducing time and effort, and maintaining consistent quality, thereby ensuring reliability of the produced structures. Nevertheless, key aspects that have received significantly little attention thus far are the “design rules” for this new manufacturing technology. Novel manufacturing technologies bring along new design capabilities and possibilities, especially complexity in the case of additive manufacturing. This review paper aims to unravel the potential for complexity and, more specifically, bio-inspired design for 3D concrete printing. Three-dimensional concrete printing is ideally suited to take advantage of the numerous design principles from nature, to improve structural properties, minimize material usage and enhance the potential for structures manufactured by 3D concrete printing. We discuss all forms of biomimicry and bio-inspired design for 3D concrete printing – laying a foundation for future work to build on. Successful cases thus far are highlighted and the latent potential of combining bio-inspiration with 3D concrete printing is demonstrated. We hope this review paper stimulates further work towards bio-inspired 3D printed concrete structures with unique properties.