Wood-based Oriented Object Deposition

Wood has long been used in furniture, construction, and structural applications due to its durability, aesthetic appeal, and natural abundance. Beyond these conventional uses, recent attention has focused on the lightweight nature, sustainability, and distinctive structural features of wood, including aligned fibrous architecture and intrinsic porosity, as desirable attributes for advanced material applications such as energy storage, transparent wood, high-strength components, and fluidic systems. However, the absence of methods to construct three-dimensional structures while preserving the intrinsic architecture of wood has limited its potential for advanced applications. Here, we introduce Wood-based Oriented Object Deposition (WOOD), a fabrication approach that enables the construction of three-dimensional wood structures while maintaining the natural fiber alignment and porosity of wood. WOOD adapts digital light processing (DLP) 3D printing by employing sliced wood sheets that are impregnated with a photocrosslinkable prepolymer. These sheets are sequentially stacked and selectively photopolymerized to form laminated structures with enhanced interfacial bonding and preserved anisotropic organization. Using WOOD, we demonstrate the fabrication of geometrically complex structures with tunable mechanical properties by leveraging the directional fiber orientation and porous network of natural wood. Furthermore, the capillary-driven fluid transport capability of wood is utilized to realize functional fluidic architectures. This approach provides a scalable strategy for producing high-resolution, mechanically robust, and intricately designed wood-based advanced devices while retaining the inherent characteristics.