Additive manufacturing in industry

The advent of additive manufacturing (AM) processes applied to the fabrication of structural components has created the need for design methodologies and structural optimization approaches that take into account the specific characteristics of the fabrication process. While AM processes give unprecedented geometrical design freedom, which can result in significant reductions in the components’ weight (e.g., through part count reduction), on the other hand, they have implications for the fatigue and fracture strength, because of residual stresses and microstructural features. This is due to stress concentration effects, anisotropy, distortions and defects whose effects still need investigation. This Special Issue aims at gathering together research investigating the different features of AM processes with relevance for their structural behavior, particularly, but not exclusively, from the viewpoints of fatigue, fracture and crash behavior. Although the focus of this Special Issue is on AM, articles dealing with other manufacturing processes with related analogies can also be included, in order to establish differences and possible similarities.