3D printing of transparent glasses has the potential to revolutionize the way one of mankind’s oldest materials can be shaped. Currently, two major strategies are used to shape transparent glasses: direct printing as well as indirect based approaches using glass precursors, which are shaped like a polymer and subsequently converted in an oven process. Direct laser sintering approaches have so far mostly been done using relatively large micron-sized particles, leading to porous and non-transparent glass components. In their current paper, Maniewski et al. demonstrate that laser cladding, a method where sub-micron glass particles are injected into a laser beam, can be used to fabricate transparent glass coatings. Although the method still needs a final polishing step to yield transparent glass, this technology could be of great interest for creating glass coatings on a variety of substrates, e.g. for chemical protection.

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