new material

Aluminum is nice and light, but that comes at the cost of strength. By introducing faults into the metal’s crystalline structure, researchers at Purdue University have now developed new aluminum alloys that are about as strong as stainless steel, and they could make for corrosion-resistant coatings.

Working with cellulose from trees, researchers have produced fibers claimed to be as strong as steel, and versatile enough to replace strands of fiberglass or lengths of cotton whilst still remaining biodegradable.