The emergence of "4D printing" | Skylar Tibbits

3D printing has grown in sophistication since the late 1970s; TED Fellow Skylar Tibbits is shaping the next development, which he calls 4D printing, where the fourth dimension is time. This emerging technology will allow us to print objects that then reshape themselves or self-assemble over time. Think: a printed cube that folds before your eyes, or a printed pipe able to sense the need to expand or contract.
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[@GrantStinnett]

Awesome! Can't wait for the "Just add water and grow your own new car!"

[@muffinspuffinsEE]

lol you still think of cars when you see this XD

[@XisoLate]

Riccardo Bestetti And it runs on water man!

[@TrollingDr]

XisoLate and it also run on the water

[@hmmm7250]

Crash it . . . . Oh my . . . . . Hold on . . . . wait a few minutes . . . . Hmmm . . . . continue driving like nothing happened :-)

[@JaredAllaway]

Hmmm and it would be driving itself too, no car insurance, no tickets for texting and driving. No garbage truck drivers, no postal truck drivers, no pizza delivery drivers, etc.

[@RobertShaverOfAustin]

I hope IKEA can make their stuff self-assemble.

[@DxBlack]

And self-fall apart...

[@W4ldgeist]

They already do that. Takes a couple of months to a year. Great tech :D

[@polemic1877]

4D printing is a good idea. That's taking scam to the next level. "Didn't receive our product? Well, did you look in the fourth dimention?" We don't even have 3D-printers yet, much less 4D.

[@spookeylordzey8432]

Pole Mic what do you mean we don't have 3-d printers?

[@cosmosity1693]

@@W4ldgeist I know such great "4D" subtractive manufacturing. It's even better than 5-axis CNCing!

[@charackthe]

My vga cable bends itself back its kinda same thing

[@BronyLuck1538]

Yavuz Ekim Bovkır oh god, mine does the same thing. I knew there was something sketchy going on here. My cables are attempting to create themselves in 4d.

[@almosthuman4457]

🤣

[@jamesmiller3893]

The first thing that popped into my mind was a space ship loaded with millimeter thick sheets that when laid out on the Moon, Mars or in space could, when activated transform themselves into habitable structures.

[@Quazi-moto]

I can't see me trusting an enclosure that's only half a millimeter thick, especially on another planet.

[@spookeylordzey8432]

quazzie1 you can put multiple sheets next to each other so they're more than 1mm THICC

[@SapioiT]

@@spookeylordzey8432 hen what's the point? Better use a balloon!

[@Krytern]

@@spookeylordzey8432 If they aren't somehow fused together, that still isn't structurally sound

[@jeangodecoster]

I shared this to my oral expression students as a counter-example of a good presentation. This guy talks about a fascinating subject, but exhibits such stoicism and lack of passion with regards to his presentation that it feels like he lost the bet on "who will do the presenting"

[@biker451]

jean-gobert de coster He must have had a bet going with his friends about how many times he could use "this is" in 40 seconds. 6 times probably would win that bet. One of the worst presentations, and presenter, that I've seen.

[@cevxj]

Ok.

[@koko56]

I think it depends on your background. If you are engineering/handyman based this is quite interesting because you are going through concepts in your mind and the possibilities they entail.

[@andresvaldivia9078]

I agree, only because of the subject I was fascinated!

[@davidhelmer149]

Burn

[@sentdex]

It seems people are confusing 4 dimensions with the proposed "4th dimension." You can program 2 dimensional arrays... 3 dimensional arrays... OR TEN dimensional arrays. You can even program 500 dimensional arrays. That must blow some of your minds.

[@Skyoneder]

does not compute, I'd be impressed if it can create a lifelike chick who can fulfull my sexual pleasures.

[@EXOglobe]

Skeelo Get a baby chicken stuff animal and wrap it around your hand.

[@tyraelarchangel183]

+sentdex Arrays really aren't hard to understand when you get down to it from a simple computer science standpoint. A 1 dimensional array is an array, a "single line" of elements. A 2d array is an ARRAY containing an Array. That basically every element of the first 1D array, contains another 1D array. Same process continues. A 3d array is an array containing an array which in turn contains the final array. Anything beyond 3D/4D is hard to visualize or impossible, yes. But you basically extend the concept of arrays containing arrays. Not really mind blowing, just a simple concept.

[@jensstegeby6141]

But what he does is more like putting a string of commands in the third lvl of the array and calling it a 4th dimension.

[@onee]

Are we confusing it or is Skylar Tibbits confusing it?

[@chackysbills5129]

This guy is like me when I was in high school turning in an essay. I had a great title with neat font, lots of colors, neat transparent folder to tuck my essay into but then I get a D+ for content and not citing sources.

[@crusindc5282]

Those two problems actually can be solved easily, if anyone had taught you how. 1) Any time you are doing student or professional reading, key in or write out the interesting quotes along with the citation. 2) Maintain an ongoing bibliography of stuff you are reading. Then when you go for your degree or graduated degree you will already have 2/3 of the classwork already completed. Academic papers average 3 quotes per page. 3) START you essay by selecting a string of quotes that flow from one to the next harmoniously before you ever add a word of your own. 5). Dump your ideas into those containers, and you have the problems managed. You had the ideas all the time. Nobody had taught you a method/of rocesd for organizing and displaying them. The challenge when writing an essay is that you have to have a process for excluding infinity. The problem isn't getting enough to say but in figuring out what to exclude. 4). Learn 'rhetorical modes.'. The complete list of them included 9. Write the introduction last as a summary of what you have written and shape the summary as a definition paragraph or section. Write the conclusion as a persuasive paragraph or section. In a thesis it dissertation, include a section/chapter in each rhetorical mode in order to get the required length, unless some other structure becomes obvious to you.

[@feraudyh]

They were not beakers at 3.56 but flasks. There you go, I have had my pedantic moment. Apart from that the presentation is fascinating.

[@FraktalPriest]

that made me smile :)

[@C00LX100]

20 years from now and this guy will sweep the world with claytronics

[@bryandrap123]

Its still 3D though

[@xZerplinxProduction]

+Bryan Draper just like those 3d movies called 4d because the chairs shakes

[@LaPingvino]

+Bryan Draper depends on your definition of dimension ;)

[@ACMHK11]

ikr, should be called virtual 3D instead.

[@atulpurna1936]

you are correct in a sense

[@xres1329]

Variable shape 3D. I have REAL 4D printing in mind, we should try it!

[@nicoleyizhenke]

This makes me think of the animation - Big Hero 6. So amazing to see this cool technology might emerge someday.

[@jaredcaspertyler1323]

it would be cool if we had like shoelaces that tied themselves though lol

[@politicallyunreliable4985]

velcro

[@Queer_Nerd_For_Human_Justice]

I like the cloth-covered elastic ones that look like old wall phone cords. Springy.

[@SubjektDelta]

Hickies.

[@johnmoore333]

Hello from the future we got you

[@michaelhughes5596]

We have Hickies - elastic no tie shoelaces.

[@gizachewdiga7648]

The best lecture. The illustration from 0D (quantum dots) - 4D (multiphase materials).It has got an application in modeling of Nanostructure, proteins, Biochips, Microchips, and bioelectroics. Thanks!

[@siddharthshetty4559]

I didn't get this From where did that strand inside water get the energy to transform into a cube or MIT

[@TrungNguyen-mj2id]

Like you dipping a sponge into water, from where did it get the energy to get it expand.

[@joemaffei]

I can see this being used to manufacture emergency rafts for ships. You could have a whole fleet of folded rafts that are compact to store and take their shape when in contact with water.

[@DeathToCockroaches]

The figures he choose are a bit abstract for demonstration I think

[@TheDrumEquation]

I'm so impressed with your knowledge...

[@JRo250]

I'm going to bookmark this talk as my go-to reference for the latest acronyms and buzz words. That was great!

[@individualone]

3d printing is getting cooler and cooler... it's revolutionizing our reality!AWESOME 👍

[@ReplayTJ]

This seems like a great technological advancement. I'm excited to see when this can be put to use.

[@juraj3315]

I seems to me that the biggest problem of such structures is that you need energy supply throughout the structure and in the case of self correcting structures you practically need abundance of it. Would explain why most "self-assembling" structures are on a nano scale.

[@powertothepeople12]

One major obstacle I'm curious to see how they're going to overcome is how to control these transformations more. For example, the string seemed to transform from straight string to MIT with a touch, and keeping it at the MIT form seemed simple enough but what if one wanted to keep it in its string form?

[@RamLaska]

Reminds me of The Diamond Age v Hackworth's chevalier. It printed on a small public "3d printer" (that word had not yet been coined when the book was written), and unfolded into a mechanical horse.

[@sarwan476]

4D printing is just a fancy name for 3D printing of shape memory alloys, which is a fancy name for multilayer 2D printing.

[@darkcyborgsuperman9521]

That's like saying a Tesseract is an automated cube ,just saying.😅

[@KevinHigby]

Thank you! This is not very widely-known information, and it's refreshing to see it stated so clearly. There's a lot of confusion about this all over youtube. I think there are more comments on this video about the presenter's interpretation of "dimensions" than about the actual technology he's talking about. Simply put, he's talking about printing objects using all four dimensions, the three spacial dimensions AND the time dimension. Quite interesting, really.

[@heddie152]

We live in such an amazing time in history for science.

[@TheFolkUtopia]

Using 4D to describe this does two things; allows for a different take on the concept and also using the debate to draw attention to the new concept. Nice presentation.

[@LeonidasGGG]

This is really, really awesome... Imagine the applications. :O

[@nicklaw2807]

Amazing development. Keep up the good work.

[@InfiniteUniverse88]

The time variable is present in 3D printing as well. Electrons don't just stand still.

[@convergenceof1312]

This is awesome.... great job

[@richardjones4259]

Very interesting and thought provoking!

[@lisssabakergaal]

Simply amazing!

[@johnsonhoang1090]

This might have some application in cardiovascular stents! very awesome

[@andy4an]

Great TED talk.

[@Ieripk]

This is so cool! Technology never ceases to develop and surprise me.

[@aslt5711]

I wonder how all of these great minds can organize themselves and form teams that work together to bring something new to the world.. like.. how is it even done?..

[@crusindc5282]

Usually somebody pays them to hang out together or let's them use their garage.

[@jamaicanlumberjack]

Well done. Well done.

[@KevinHigby]

Minutephysic's channel did a great video on dimensions. Basically, what they said was that a dimension is simply a parameter with which matter can be described. 1D, 2D, 3D and 4D simply describe the numbers of parameters matter has, but none of them specifically refer to any parameter. For example everything in our universe consists of 3 spacial dimensions and 1 time dimension (pretty much). Time isn't THE 4th dimension, but it is one of the four parameters of a 4D system. Hope that helps. :)

[@ductuslupus87]

Ted really does put some good stuff on this.

[@HunterRodrigez]

i like your way of thinking sir

[@repthedeaf4236]

4-D printing can be more than creating a new way of production. The idea behind is that you can take multi-material 3D printing so you can deposit multiple materials and you add a new capability which is transformed right out of the bed. The parts can transform from one shape to another shape directly on their own.

[@FrozenguyRS]

Man is a beast of marketing.

[@TheMinimumPC]

Thanks for your nice comment :D

[@ClemonsKunkel]

Very Cool. 4D printing is awesome. Heat changes water changed it cold changes it. That is the future. I Love TED talks. the guy was like a robot though he didn't have a lot of passion. It was a lot of good science but no passion still good though. People want passion when they see something, most anyway. Very to the point and right on with the information that's also important. I love the Talk.

[@ra8620]

Studying the atomic bonding infrastructure when you bend a pipe what is the change of the atomic structure in the effected area where was the force or heat or tharmal energy was implied.

[@sether255]

he raises a valid point. before the candle maker could learn to make light bulbs, here they would learn the new job of creating self replicating objects, a job they would lose after the first one was made.

[@DanielLimmy]

This is very impressive!

[@deejaycalanoc]

I used to do the same thing with the paper casing of a straw. Scrunch it into an accordion shape, pull it off the straw and put a drop of water on it and BAM! I would of done a Ted Talk for a fraction of his pay!

[@davidclaywood]

Totally Awesome creative thinking. There is allot of innovation to be done yet but I am glad that it is being done.

[@trpyman]

I want that beaker thing

[@weepingod]

i tink its accurate as the product changes shape over time instead of being a static 3d object.

[@Exceltrainingvideos]

Very very interesting!

[@chilllzoneee]

This is amazing

[@TutoLab]

and Boom! that's how capsule corp came out

[@krazybassist64]

Michael Crichton's "Prey". What a visionary, RIP

[@crimsonpotemkin]

this is amazing

[@comatoastlife]

Literally throwing metals at a hurricane and a truck comes out lol

[@Heynicetie]

I had a magic wand like that, that used elastic to make it look like it could raise in your palm. That's what I got out of this talk. A memory.

[@15sowens]

How would one get ahold of one of those beaker/jars?

[@gimpdoctor8362]

there are different types of dimensions. the 4th dimension is often referred to as time because it's "a" fourth that we commonly encounter. the 4th spacial dimension however is not time.

[@CCPearce]

MIND BLOWN.

[@brendansullivan4872]

Very cool stuff here!

[@Chuck.1715]

I don't know what everyone has with additional space dimensions, we use tri-axial system to mesure objects so we have 3D world (sometimes it is needed to add fourth dimension the "time"). It is just an perception and it's not written in stone that we must use it. The reality is more like chaos of particles with vector and speed. But it is not a chaos, each action has corresponding reaction, and even every photon moove affects each surrounding particle and that creates the white noise of quantum mechanics, whitch is not random at all, we just can't see trough and when we try to we are projecting our perception into the quantum world that we see.

[@derekwood3980]

Sounds like SKYNET

[@jasonnewbon1803]

well said

[@dimaster5880]

fantastic!

[@DakotaMartinez32]

so materials that can repair themselves with a little kinetic or electric energy?

[@juraj3315]

I have a hunch that it's not "little" energy as I would assume it to be quite inefficient (working with random forces or energy transferred through the whole surface).

[@ultrapowermae]

So... Legos with magnets? Modular element with one or more "low energy states"?

[@mathewstubbs2117]

Brilliant but....pipelines - so would the pipe diameter increase with flow demand? Problems - clashes with other services like electricity or sewerage after expansion, weaker pipe due to expansion but increase in forces due to flow increase. Flow is dependant on the storm intensity and sometimes pit inlet surcharge is intentional for stormwater design, for example a q100 (1 in 100 year storm event), where hydrology becomes more important than hydraulics. Would the pipe attempt to correct itself outside of design parameters? From a geotechnical standpoint how would this effect topography? What happens to the extra volume of dirt once a pipe increases in diameter? How would an increase in pipe size upstream effect smaller downstream pipes given the variance of rainfall within different catchment areas? If constructed in upper parts of the catchments, the entire downstream would also need replacing (catchments are considered during design for both major and minor stormwater events), and pipe sizing is well thought out and crucial to avoid property damage, flooding and personal injuries. Water pipelines - always under pressure (hydraulic grade line is higher than top of pipe and does not rely on gravity). If pipe size increases, so does volume and capacity - however, incresing pipe diameter decreases in a lower pressure in the system that will not only effect both commercial and residential property water supply but also could reduce pressure to hydrants the is crucial in emergency situations for fire fighters. Food for thought anyways.

[@shwhjw]

Settings -> Speed -> 1.25

[@hpesoj501]

im thinking of a device that could be kept in the home "print" meds. and thanks for your input

[@nidodson]

Reminds me of Ancient Greece philosophers reading someone speak like that, and that last line reminds me of Ancient Roman stories, haha. That is an insane concept, and one that really leads to many questions. How many people would still contribute to bringing society forward? How many would just reproduce? How many would degrade the quality of society? What would be the balance? The religious right should be supporting it to have more time dedicating themselves to their religions.

[@DocHephaestus]

Please link me to some info on that? Appreciate much.

[@lanceroark6386]

THIS IS EXACTLY HOW EVOLUTION WORKS!! BY DESIGN!!!

[@helmus2000]

how does a light switch changes shape ?

[@team_hong_c4841]

10/26 twelveth video(sorry i'm tooooooo late...but i come back!) The thing that i always feel after watching ted video is the world is changing, and developing quickly much more than I thought. Actually,when i first used 3d printer in my university, i was very impressed because I think it would take more time to use 3d printer in real life. In the same way, the 4d printing technolgy, also looks unfamiliar now, but in the near future, it could be also used in the real life! Because engineers know how hard it is to design and make something(including me!)

[@Pollution122]

I've seen a number of articles about origami satellites over the last couple of years, very reminiscent

[@jeromegoodwin3848]

Bull is it made in the finial shape then changed until it is needed in the finial shape which is obtained by heat or other means.

[@cocoman290]

Actually, it is very interesting (setting aside the fact that this is not 4D printing and that he is just making reassembling, not self-assembling materials). Imagine that we could resemble the protein function on a mayor scale. However I think that it is not just a matter of positive a negative charges, it must be more complex. For example, proteins (and some other molecules) have functions (more or less specific) which are determined by its structure and its composition (the amino acid content). Amino acids have different properties, some of which contributes to the assembly of the structure (which also depends on environmental interactions) and others to the function of the protein. However, even though there are non polar amino acids that make the protein to fold hydrophobicaly, some proteins need help from other proteins and modifications to fold as a completely functional molecule.

[@ScottishAtheist]

Awesome stuff.

[@phunmaster2000]

yeah i realized how much easier 4d printing would be for shipping and manufacturing soon after I posted that.

[@BestHBCU]

Reminds me of Star Trek Voyager's bio-neural circuitry or experiments from Star Trek the Next Generation's Wesley Crusher.

[@9mmwaffle.]

Seems too early to really have anything to present

[@kdanagger6894]

Rubber bands, magnets, and strings that shrink when they get wet is not revolutionary, or even evolutionary. This is carnival side-show snake oil. Nature self assembles and replicates things at a molecular level. That is light-years in complexity beyond the chintzy novelty store toys this guy is making.

[@carrynoweight]

Lol, any good invention follows said natural processes, listen again because that's what they are doing. Though I concede that what they are attempting is mimicry and not nearly as complex as natural processes, though I personally believe this is a step in the right direction.

[@KshitijKale]

Yes, they only shrink but they are programmable.

[@mgpstudios5388]

This is great. I'm greateful for that invention.

[@ChongTastik]

Molecular graphing? I'm sure it's been applied already. But definitely always room for innovation!

[@OrlandoMGarcia]

7:20 starting the presentation i just imagine a pipe for the exhaust of cars that adapts to heat and airflow, changing from straight pipe to helix, or the x pattern to h pattern it woud make more eficiient all kind of ICE cars

[@cthorm]

Stick with the example of plumbing. Notice anything familiar about the 'pipes' at 7:22? That's how the esophagus and intestines work. It is more complex to design in the beginning, but is more resilient and requires less maintenance over time.

[@TheLivirus]

If you consider time a dimension, an object that changes shape over time is 4D. However, using this definition, many of the objects we normally consider 3D are in fact 4D.

[@gexman31]

It would be cool if there were a material that could change it's Young's Modulus based off some transient input. Kinda like piezocrystals, but with the change being permanent.

[@racingwitsify]

This seams more of a reflex than a self assembling anything. Phone cord is pulled parcially strait then recoils. Looks like the same thing.

[@MatchstalkMan]

I need a 4D Space-Time printer - my boss wants these parts yesterday!

[@daneguitarist1]

oh man this has so many uses thanks dood! I have your first whiskey if you come around kansas

[@srimansrini]

Skylar Tibbits of M.I.T presents a talk about 4D Printing and how it going to change our 'material world' in the future. Though bit far-fetched but we should not deny its practical use. worth watching. recommended.

[@teunvl95]

It's a psychological defence mechanism to not be nervous while giving a presentation to a group op people.

[@jamesblanton9364]

WOW ! That's just wow...

[@TheMinimumPC]

Yeah, a dimension refers to any parameter of a body that is associated with a particular state of a body. That means if I change any parameter that causes a change in the object, then that parameter is a dimension. In physics, if you go down to the very basics, you can change only 4 things, 3 positions and 1 time. But according to string theory the strings also have additional states that are not related to these 4 dimensions and thus they have some additional dimensions.

[@pinakadhara7650]

Very exciting!

[@TGPadm]

i think he is speaking of 4D as time, and he is "printing" not just for "one" time but he is designing stuff with shapes over an interval of time, in some sense printing in 4D