Press releases 2022

Warehouses are home to heavy volumes of traffic. The numbers of industrial trucks (pallet trucks, forklift vehicles and the like) traversing their aisles are growing especially large – in facilities that are themselves increasing in size all the time. Under these conditions, accidents become an inevitability even if numerous safety measures are put in place. Now, optical sensors on industrial trucks might provide warehouse staff with better protection as they do their jobs. Joining forces with BASF SE and Kinotex Sensor GmbH, the Fraunhofer Application Center for Optical Metrology and Surface Technologies AZOM has developed prototypes designed to ensure added safety during day-to-day activities.

In the near future, ultrasound will enable industrial 3D printers to manufacture more robust, durable and cheaper components for aerospace, toolmaking and other industries than ever before. Researchers from Dresden, Hamburg and Melbourne, Australia, have joined forces in a research alliance to bring this new technology to market within three years. Their “UltraGrain” project, launched in June 2022, aims to produce a tailored fine-grained microstructure (“grading”) in wire- and powder-based additive manufacturing technologies which promises to improve the mechanical properties and corrosion resistance of the majority of engineering alloys.

Sandblasting – that was yesterday. Laser beams can clean and structure surfaces more precisely, cost-effectively and in environmental friendlier ways than conventional systems. The Fraunhofer Institute for Material and Beam Technology IWS in Dresden has developed the technology “LIGHTblast” for this purpose which is now being transferred to the semiconductor manufacturing, automotive supply and other industries.

German Federal Minister for Transport Dr. Volker Wissing handed over the funding notification for ”H2GO – National Fuel Cell Production Action Plan“ for around 80 million euros in Berlin today. H2GO bundles the activities of 19 Fraunhofer institutes with the aim of significantly reducing CO₂ emissions in freight mobility. The focus is on the development and rollout of industrial technologies for the economical production of fuel cells, primarily for road-based heavy-duty transport. The Fraunhofer Institute for Machine Tools and Forming Technology IWU is responsible for the overall coordination of the research network with a total of five sub-groups.

More than 100 million individuals worldwide suffer from organ fibrosis, a pathological proliferation of connective tissue in an organ, such as the lung, heart and liver. Hardly any causal treatments are available to date. The unmet medical need is partly due to the fact that the existing disease models for fibrosis research are insufficient and little predictive. Coordinated by the Fraunhofer Institute for Toxicology and Experimental Medicine ITEM, four Fraunhofer institutes have joined forces in the FibroPaths® project aimed at enabling rapid and safe development of antifibrotic drugs.

The DRYtraec^® coating process developed at the Fraunhofer Institute for Material and Beam Technology IWS allows the dry production of battery electrodes without toxic organic solvents or water. In particular, the space- and energy-intensive drying step of conventional wet-chemical coating processes is completely eliminated. In addition to environmental protection aspects, there is enormous potential for cost reduction in the battery cell production. The German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) is now funding a project with 3.7 million euros that will develop the dry-coating technology into a holistic technology platform.

Additive manufacturing processes continue to grow in the automotive, aerospace and other industries. When complex components or unique parts need to be produced, an increasing number of companies are turning to industrial 3D printing. However, the run-in curves can still be quite long, especially for small batches, and the reject rates may be high at the beginning. The Fraunhofer Institute for Material and Beam Technology IWS Dresden therefore develops modern measurement and control technology that allow additive processes to be used much more effectively than before, for example for highly automated production lines. This includes the POWDERscreen – a unique powder measuring device for laser cladding. Fraunhofer IWS will demonstrate this innovative system in May 2022 during the “3. Fachtagung Werkstoffe und Additive Fertigung“ at the German Hygiene Museum in Dresden.

High-power diode lasers with outputs of ten or more kilowatts open new application scenarios for laser cladding. Particularly sustainable and resource-efficient coatings can be produced and applied, for example in automotive, machine construction and other industries. Together with industrial partners, the Fraunhofer Institute for Material and Beam Technology IWS has developed applications and specific processes for this laser class to industry readiness under the label “HICLAD®”. The Dresden institute and its project partner Laserline will present some of these at the “LASER World of PHOTONICS” trade show in Munich at the end of April.

With immediate effect, Prof. Christoph Leyens is a presidium member of National Academy of Science and Engineering (acatech), the German Academy of Science and Engineering. He now receives this honor after having already actively participated in various working groups as a member. Leyens completes the body in which Reinhard Ploss, CEO Infineon, succeeds former President Karl-Heinz Streibich.

Energy and resource efficiency are gaining ever more significance, which is why the Fraunhofer Institute for Material and Beam Technology IWS has worked with its partners to develop an alternative for conventional steel construction that not only constitutes a process technology solution, but also forms the basis for hardware and laser safety. This solution facilitates gentler machining of high-strength materials, as well as significantly reducing energy consumption and costs while greatly increasing process speed. The energy in-put required for the component can be reduced by up to 80 percent compared with conventional joining processes. Not only that, subsequent straightening of the component is eliminated entirely from the process.