“3D printing” has applications in which of the following?
- 1.Preparation of confectionery items
- 2.Manufacture of bionic ears
- 3.Automotive industry
- 4.Reconstructive surgeries
- 5.Data processing technologies
Select the correct answer using the code given below:
Answer & explanation
Answer: (d) 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5
3D printing (additive manufacturing) builds objects layer by layer from a digital design, so it works across food, medicine, vehicles and electronics. All five uses listed have been demonstrated, which makes 'all of the above' the answer.
- ✓ 1. Chocolate and other food inks can be 3D printed; India's national strategy on additive manufacturing also names food processing as a sector.
- ✓ 2. Princeton researchers 3D printed a 'bionic ear' by combining a cell-seeded hydrogel with an embedded conducting antenna.
- ✓ 3. IIT Madras (Institute of Eminence) lists the industrialisation of additive manufacturing for aerospace, automotive, tooling and biomedical applications among its goals, and designs lattice structures and sandwich panels for automotive applications.
- ✓ 4. 3D printed patient-specific implants, for example in PEEK plastic, are used in reconstructive surgery.
- ✓ 5. Additive manufacturing sits at the intersection of computing and electronics, and India's strategy targets 3D printed electronics; UPSC's key counts this as an application.
Remember · 3D printing is layer-by-layer manufacturing from a digital file, used in food, medicine (implants, bionic organs), vehicles and electronics.
Sources
- Release of the National Strategy on Additive Manufacturing (PIB, Ministry of Electronics and IT, 24 Feb 2022) ↗ “Additive Manufacturing is next generation of digital manufacturing allows the intersection of Computing Electronics, Imaging & the emerging areas of Artificial Intelligence, Pattern Recognition … printed indigenous products for vast domestic and international market in various sectors including electronics, photonics, medical device, agro and food processing etc.”
- Chocolate-based Ink Three-dimensional Printing (Ci3DP), Scientific Reports 2019 (US NIH PubMed Central) ↗ “This paper describes an approach to perform 3D printing of chocolate-based materials in its liquid phase at room temperature”
- 3D printed bionic ears, Nano Letters 2013 (US NIH PubMed Central) ↗ “we generated a bionic ear via 3D printing of a cell-seeded hydrogel matrix in the precise anatomic geometry of a human ear”
- Patient-specific surgical implants made of 3D printed PEEK (US NIH PubMed Central) ↗ “Polyetheretherketone (PEEK) has been used, mainly in the reconstructive surgeries as a reliable alternative to other alloplastic materials for the fabrication of PSI.”
- Additive Manufacturing, IIT Madras Institute of Eminence (Future Mobility initiative) ↗ · reference work “Industrialisation of AM processes for (i) aerospace, (ii) automotive, (iii) tooling and (iv) biomedical applications”
Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper I (2018, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 1 Oct 2026 (how we verify). ·