From the Guest Editors

摘要

This year's conference in Seattle will mark the 9th anniversary of IS&T's International Conference on Digital Fabrication. As we prepare for our annual meeting, it is a good time to reflect on the history of the various methods, materials and applications that have emerged from the simple idea of transforming traditional digital printing into a new fabrication and manufacturing paradigm that has enabled the "the printing of things". It is perhaps more interesting to observe some of the unexpected domains that digital fabrication and functional printing have influenced. While it is not surprising to see the impact that digital fabrication methods, functional inks and roll-to-roll manufacturing have had on the electronics and photovoltaic industries, who would have predicted the successful adaptation of digital printing as an increasingly important tool in biofabrication, tissue engineering, drug discovery and genomics? As we