Carbon Nanotube Muscles Strong as Diamond, Flexible as Rubber
|
|
| Audience/Grade: | College Freshman-Continuing Education |
| Discipline(s): |
Ceramic Engineering Chemical, Biochemical, Biomolecular Engineering Engineering Mechanics Materials Engineering Mechanical Engineering Nanotechnology |
| Special Topic(s): | |
| Learning Resource Type: |
Reference - Article/Document |
| Media Type: |
WWW |
| Author(s): |
Brandon Keim |
| Description: | Wired online magazine article with great images and video clips. Excerpt: "Baughman and his colleagues have produced a formulation that's stronger than steel, as light as air and more flexible than rubber — a truly 21st century muscle. It could be used to make artificial limbs, "smart" skins, shape-changing structures, ultra-strong robots and — in the immediate future — highly-efficient solar cells. "We can generate about 30 times the force per unit area of natural muscle," said Baughman, director of the NanoTech Institute at the University of Texas at Dallas. Carbon nanotubes have fascinated material scientists since the early 1990s, when researchers started to explore the ultra-light, ultra-strong cylindrical molecules. Though bulk manufacturing difficulties have slowed the development of commercial applications, carbon nanotubes are already used in bicycle components, and in prototypes of airplanes, bulletproof clothing, transistors, and ropes that might someday be used to tether a space elevator. (On a historical note, carbon nanotube-infused" steel was used to made Damascus blades, renowned as history's sharpest swords, though the technique has been lost.) |
| Rating: | No Rating |
| Related Resources | |
| Keywords: | carbon nanotubes Ray Baughman |
| Usage Tip | |
| Related ABET Criteria: |
(b) Design and conduct experiments, analyze and interpret data |
| Version Info | |
| Publication Date: | March 2009 |
| Platform/Format: |
WWW |
| Cost: |
Free |
| Download URL: | http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/03/nanomuscle.html |
| Metadata: |
IEEE LOM Record |
| Collection: |
NEEDS
|
