Material Tougher Than Diamond Developed 237
sporkme has handed us a link to a New Scientist article. The piece outlines the development of a new substance reported to be stiffer than diamond. A team of scientists from Washington, Wisconsin, and Germany combined the ceramic barium titanate and white-hot molten tin with an ultrasonic probe. The new material was, in some tests, almost 10x more resistant to bending than diamond. Composite materials researcher Mark Spearing of Southampton University comments on the result: "The material's stiffness results from the properties of the barium titanate pieces, Spearing says. As the material cools, its crystal structure changes, causing its volume to expand. 'Because they are held inside the tin matrix, strain builds up inside the barium titanate,' Spearing explains, 'at a particular temperature that energy is released to oppose a bending force.'"
Space flight (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Ah misleading Slashdot article titles... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Bah (Score:1, Interesting)
resistant to bending .... (Score:5, Interesting)
This, "resistant to bending" terminology seems like a real stretch of imagination to me. When do we, as average people ever consider the force involved in -bending- a diamond? It really doesn't sound like a practical thought experiment, and therefore doesn't sound even mildly interesting.
Spider's Silk is 'stronger' than steel - we've all heard. But there's about 1000 reasons you can't build a ship, or a building or even a walking-cane out of spider's silk.
This just sounds like bad hype to me ; what I want to know, and what I think everybody wants to know is - will you be able to CUT THE DIAMOND with this material. Diamonds have been the upper-limit of our prowess with cutting-wheels ; do you have a better material for grinding and cutting? Don't confuse the issue.
Unfortunately I couldn't read the article (slashdotted? what the hell) so I'm going based on the write-up available. don't hate me if the article answers my question.
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hate me? nahhh [douginadress.com]
Re:Bah (Score:1, Interesting)
Your other posts don't make you look like a troll, but I suspect you might be prone to flippant comments like this one. Try to restrain yourself.
Re:resistant to bending .... (Score:5, Interesting)
No, you will not. The material is only stiffer than diamond in a narrow temperature range. If you tried to cut with it, it would heat up and lose this stiffness.
The article does a lousy job of explaining this temperature-dependent stiffness to non-experts. From what I understand, this is how it works: one of the two components is like a framework of tinkertoys, and the other is like a bunch of water balloons filling up the gaps in the tinkertoy structure. Both the tinkertoys and the water expand as the material's temperature is increased, possibly at varying rates. In that small range at 58 degrees F, the water baloons fit very tightly in the structure. They strain the tinkertoys, but don't break them. The tinkertoys flex as they usually would because the water balloons are holding them in place, so the entire assembly is very stiff.
Re:resistant to bending .... (Score:5, Interesting)
The hardest known material, at present, would be aggregated diamond nanorods. (These are apparently produced by crushing buckyballs at extreme pressures. What "Get Fuzzy" makes of this is currently unknown.)
Re:Space flight (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:That's impossible! (Score:2, Interesting)
Nerds are smarties, geeks are asocial gimps.
My "(equal 'hard 'tough) => nil" story (Score:2, Interesting)
I needed an Allen Key in a small size that I didn't have.
I took a nail and filed one end to make a hexagon of the correct size.
I bent it to the traditional L shape. Nails are "tough as nails" so it bent without breaking.
I attempted to undo the socket cap screw. The edges of my hexagon got squished. Nails are "hard as nails"? Wood thinks so, but socket cap screws are unimpressed.
Plan B: file a hexagon on the end of a piece of "silver" steel. Heat to cherry red on gas stove. Quench. Bake at gas mark 9 for twenty minutes to anneal. Use on socket cap screw. Success!
If "hard" is what you need, "hard" is what you have to get, "tough" will not unscrew it.