Why scientists are making transparent wood / The results are amazing, that a piece of wood can be as strong as glass::The material is being exploited for smartphone screens, insulated windows, and more.
Wood is already strong than glass. If you read the article, what they say make sense, but this title is silly.
bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 11 months ago
I remember NileRed spent ages trying to reproduce this. The material seems very difficult to make.
stevedidWHAT@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Came here to say this! Did you see the one where he tried to make the bullet proof wood too?
So much left to be discovered in this world! 🤩
Excrubulent@slrpnk.net 11 months ago
Tried and succeeded. Honestly I was thinking about the possibilities if he used the same treatment technique to glue the boards, and if he criss-crossed the grains like plywood. The biggest weakness of the composite boards seemed to be how well they were glued.
Like I absolutely wasn’t expecting it to stop a real calibre, but there seemed to be a critical thickness where even 9mm practically bounced off.
Also I’m really impressed with how simple the process was to replicate. Seems like the basic idea is, “the wood’s not alive anymore so we can strip out all the stuff it doesn’t need and just leave the structural fibres”.
DemBoSain@midwest.social 11 months ago
To be fair, he’s more chemist than mechanical engineer. He got the chemistry down right away, but post-processing took a bit longer than I think it should have (speaking as a mechanical engineer…)
Excrubulent@slrpnk.net 11 months ago
The idea to confine it sideways definitely seemed to take longer to appear than I thought it would. Like, yeah man, if you squish it, it’ll spread out. But maybe he was reluctant to add complexity when he didn’t have any experience designing parts like that. Also I wonder what would happen if it was confined both ways and then criss-crossed like plywood with multiple layers in a single pressing.