Uniformly Distributed Circular Porous Pattern Generation on Surface for 3D Printing

Source abstract

We present an algorithm for uniformly distributed circular porous pattern generation on surface for three-dimensional (3D) printing using a phase-field model. The algorithm is based on the narrow band domain method for the nonlocal Cahn–Hilliard (CH) equation on surfaces. Surfaces are embedded in 3D grid and the narrow band domain is defined as the neighborhood of surface. It allows one can perform numerical computation using the standard discrete Laplacian in 3D instead of the discrete surface Laplacian. For complex surfaces, we reconstruct them from point cloud data and represent them as the zero-level set of their discrete signed distance functions. Using the proposed algorithm, we can generate uniformly distributed circular porous patterns on surfaces in 3D and print the resulting 3D models. Furthermore, we provide the test of accuracy and energy stability of the proposed method.