Increasing the degree

Several US research centers have published the results of the creation and testing of some new materials on their websites. In the near future, their “babies” will help solve complex engineering and design problems associated with temperature constraints relating to the operation of machines and mechanisms. This will help speed up the global technological progress.

Scientists from Sandia National Laboratories working on non-nuclear components of nuclear weapons, have obtained an alloy that is superior in hardness to all substances known on our planet. Details of combining gold and platinum in a 9 to 1 ratio are naturally classified. But it is already known that this technology allows to greatly reduce the cost of synthesis of diamond-like carbon and, accordingly, change directions in many branches of modern engineering. By the way, the alloy itself is not solid at all; its extraordinary properties are manifested in mechanical and temperature stability under friction.

Physicists from the University of Colorado Boulder, a major research university in the United States, presented a structure, which easily changes its shape under the influence of temperature, and then independently returns to its original state! They constructed origami cranes from the flexible material based on liquid crystal drives. When heated above 90 degrees, the figure disintegrated, but when it cooled down, it completely recovered its shape, without any “outside help”. In combination with other flexible materials, the novel material is expected to find its applications in robotics, medicine, geology etc.

Scientists from the University of Wisconsin Madison also worked hard on uncovering the temperature’s secrets, or more precisely, on how to keep them. They came up with a very light “blanket” for heat masking. They used the so-called black silicon, which is used in solar batteries. Structurally, it consists of vertical microscopic needles that absorb light radiation. A special arrangement method with silver microparticles allows the ultra-thin coating to absorb infrared rays almost completely. It means that the current civilian or military guiding systems are rendered useless by this stealth material. The conclusion: people have to invent a fundamentally new way to destroy themselves.