3-D Printing Whole Buildings in Stone...in Space: This Printer Rocks

Enrico Dini's brilliant-or-crazy (or both) prototype machine prints entire buildings in solid rock... On the MOON!

In Pisa, Italy, mad genius Enrico Dini is building sandcastles on the moon. His giant 3-D printer is the first of its kind with the potential to print whole buildings, and it makes them out of solid rock, cutting down a thousand-year-long process into a few minutes. It uses sand, but someday it'll use moon dust.

The machine, called D-Shape, sprays a thin layer of sand with a...