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Science

Sheared Aluminum's Odd, Possibly Useful Behavior 36

Posted by timothy from the sliced-at-the-root dept.
Chiggy_Von_Richtoffe writes "Researchers at Ohio State University have turned up some interesting things about aluminum when sheared at the atomic leavel. Apparently it mimics certain ceramics and semiconductors, as well as having a stronger shear-strength than copper. I can't wait until we can get all sorts of cool new toys from this vein of research."
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Sheared Aluminum's Odd, Possibly Useful Behavior More

Sheared Aluminum's Odd, Possibly Useful Behavior

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  • Scotty could have told 'em the about the formula for Transparent Aluminum.

  • Aluminium (Score:1, Flamebait)

    by Trusty Penfold ( 615679 )
    The name of the element is Aluminium [webelements.com]

    • Re:Aluminium (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Not if you're a resident of the U.S. One of those spelling differences I believe.

    • Re:Aluminium (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Only if you have such bad teeth that you can't pronounce it correctly.

    • Re:Aluminium (Score:3, Informative)

      by Monkelectric ( 546685 )
      actually if you read your own damn link you linked to you would have seen:

      ...In 1761 de Morveau proposed the name "alumine" for the base in alum. In 1807, Davy proposed the name alumium for the metal, undiscovered at that time, and later agreed to change it to aluminum. Shortly thereafter, the name aluminium was adopted by IUPAC to conform with the "ium" ending of most elements. Aluminium is the IUPAC spelling and therefore the international standard. Aluminium was also the accepted spelling in the U.S.A. until 1925, at which time the American Chemical Society decided to revert back to aluminum, and to this day Americans still refer to aluminium as "aluminum".

    • ... and actors that play British scientist in the movies pronouce it aluminium and then run off to have a spot of tea.

    • Spelled just like "Platinium", "Molybdenium", and "Lanthanium".

  • cool toys? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by jericho4.0 ( 565125 )
    'this could mean that aluminum behaves more like ceramics in certain ways than anyone had previously thought'

    Sorry, but this just doesn't qualify as news. Science, yes. But even as science it's just another tiny step towards our nano-tech-utopia fantasy.

  • so what kind of applications would this lead to? they talk about sheared aluminum having the same properties as ceramics.... making plates and cups out of sheared aluminum? or maybe a flywheel/clutch?

    aluminum's low melting point seems to really hinder it's usefulness in ceramic applications, as one of ceramic's strong points is it's imperviousness to intense and prolonged heat.
    • Text taken from the article itself:
      > Specifically, they studied a process known as pure shear strain, in which a layer of atoms slides over a second layer of atoms. The reliability and durability of very small electronic devices, in which temperatures fluctuations often cause materials to expand or contract, depends in part on how their components react to the effects of shear strain. The researchers determined that two layers of copper atoms typically slide over each other quite smoothly.

      ok, so taking that into consideration it gives researchers a better idea of how to deal with the limitations of laying down circuitry as we approach Moore's wall.

      ~facists gotta love 'em, If you don't they shoot you!

    • Re:ceramic? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Raiford ( 599622 )
      Ceramics are not isolated to high-temperature engineering applications. High-dielectric materials such as the titanates for capacitors and many pizeoelectrics are used at room termperature just like other semiconductor materials.

    • Aluminum makes a far better ceramic when oxidized: extremely hard, temperature resistant, transparent in crystalline form, and if you mix a bit of chromium in, it'll even lase. It's called corundum, or sapphire in crystalline form (or ruby with a little chromium added).

  • quasicrystals! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by apsmith ( 17989 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:24PM (#4539925) Homepage
    Hey, that's what I did my PhD thesis work in! :-)

    Aluminum is the largest component of the most easily formed [caltech.edu]
    "quasicrystals", and this analysis seems to be yet another indication that the seemingly normal metal face-centered-cubic structure of alumnium is actually not very far removed from some quite strange states of matter. Further evidence is right there on the periodic table - gallium, just below Al, has one of the strangest ground-state structures of any metal, and melts at a balmy 35 degrees Celsius!

    For those who have access, I actually wrote a paper on this [aps.org] over 10 years ago... ah the memories...

  • Lithium (Score:3, Funny)

    by lommer ( 566164 ) on Saturday October 26, 2002 @11:24PM (#4539928)
    I am so tired that when I first read the article, I thought they interviewed a lithium about the subject. I was really starting to wonder what was wrong until I realized the researcher's name was Li...

  • Shearing Evironment +Controls? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Nyphur ( 514992 ) <nyphur@gmail.com> on Sunday October 27, 2002 @02:16PM (#4542558) Homepage
    What environment was this shearing done in and was the aluminium used pure? If it was done in a non-sterile environment, acidic particulates could have reacted with the momomolecular aluminium sheet. Assuming the alumininum was pure, they should have left a control which is a polymolecular block of the element, left in the shearing environment. That way they could check the top layer of the control and if any changes had occured, the top momomolecular layer, the experiement would have been invalid because a change would ahve occured in the momomolecular sheet. Aluminium is quite reactive so was an inert gas placed over the sample as it was sheared?... Otherwise it may have reacted or oxidised. It would require very little contamination to ruin the sheet since it is only one molecule thick.

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