{"id":304,"date":"2021-01-25T16:19:00","date_gmt":"2021-01-25T21:19:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/?p=304"},"modified":"2026-03-26T14:59:41","modified_gmt":"2026-03-26T18:59:41","slug":"aa-e10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/aa-e10\/","title":{"rendered":"Advancing Additive #10 &#8211; Implicit Modeling for Lattice-based Engineered Structures"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Additive manufacturing has made it possible for companies to bring to life complex, nature-inspired designs leveraging engineered structures such as gyroids that require minimal or no supports when 3D printed. These structures, which you\u2019ll find in butterfly wings and liquid crystals, are an example of triply periodic minimal surface (TPMS) structures. They\u2019re particularly valuable for certain AM-driven applications, such as heat exchangers in aerospace and implant fills in the medical industry, due to their structural and thermal properties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The problem with using TPMS structures for AM is the difficulty of designing them. With the latest release of NX (1953), that problem has been solved. NX has introduced a new \u201cimplicit modeling\u201d module for creating equation-driven structures that can\u2019t be designed through traditional CAD methods. The module includes a general equation builder with pre-defined examples and an out-of-the-box set of TPMS structures, including gyroids. In addition, the shelling, Boolean and blend operations of the new module are extremely robust, as this video example shows:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-video\"><video controls src=\"https:\/\/videos.mentor-cdn.com\/mgc\/videos\/5400\/9ff15fc7-9ad4-47f4-a02b-9564080d9294-en-US-video.mp4\" playsinline><\/video><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>With this new implicit modeling module, users can create the kinds of natural structures that are proving so valuable in the development of additive manufacturing\u2014optimizing their designs for such advantages as lightweighting, thermal flow, energy absorption, and 3D printing efficiency. And because the module is tightly connected within the AM design environment, model changes\u2014even for features as complex as these engineered structures\u2014are quickly and easily accomplished. While there may be niche software packages that can support TPMS modeling, none are woven as seamlessly into the end-to-end AM digital thread as NX\u2019s new implicit modeling module.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-text-color has-background has-vivid-green-cyan-background-color has-vivid-green-cyan-color\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>About the writer<\/strong>:<br><strong><em>Aaron Frankel<\/em><\/strong><em>&nbsp;is Vice President of Siemens&#8217; additive manufacturing software program. He has over 20 years of experience in the PLM software industry and has held various positions in engineering services, product management, and marketing \u2013 all focused on helping manufacturers take advantage of the latest digital design and manufacturing technology.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Implicit modeling allows you to design complex equation-driven structures suitable for 3D printing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61920,"featured_media":306,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spanish_translation":"","french_translation":"","german_translation":"","italian_translation":"","polish_translation":"","japanese_translation":"","chinese_translation":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1,114],"tags":[116,117,118,125,128],"industry":[66,72,89],"product":[218,398],"coauthors":[404],"class_list":["post-304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-video","tag-3d-printing","tag-additive-manufacturing","tag-computer-aided-design-cad","tag-digital-twin","tag-industry-4-0","industry-automotive-transportation","industry-consumer-products-retail","industry-industrial-machinery-heavy-equipment","product-nx","product-nx-additive-manufacturing"],"featured_image_url":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/30\/2021\/01\/AA-10-ImplicitModeling-Blog.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61920"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=304"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":308,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/304\/revisions\/308"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/306"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=304"},{"taxonomy":"industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/industry?post=304"},{"taxonomy":"product","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product?post=304"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.sw.siemens.com\/additive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}