Table 1.

Comparison between various features of interest for LMD and SLM.

Feature	Laser Melting Deposition	Selective Laser Melting
Raw materials	Powder, wire	Powder
Heat source	Laser	Laser, electron beam
Technology	Powder is sprayed through a nozzle and melted by a laser beam	Beam transfers heat that melts a powder bed
Typical materials	Metals, ceramics	Metals, ceramics, polymers
Limitations by direction/axis	No	Yes
Resolution	Low	High
Versatility	High: used for coating, parts manufacturing, and in situ alloying	Low: limited to parts production
Parts size	Usually large scale objects	Usually small scale objects
The possibility of parts repair	Yes	No
Structural and compositional in situ modifications	Yes: easy to produce multi-structures and parts with compositional gradient, allows for in situ alloying	No: limited to one type of powder/cycle
Mesh structures	No	Yes
Post-processing requirements	Yes	Yes
Costs	High: high power laser sources and robots required	Lower: more compact machines, easy to implement in industry
Application in the biomedical field	Currently very low	Quite advanced: e.g., implemented in dental cabinets for the manufacturing of personalized dental prostheses