Advanced Materials

Founded in 2002 by manufacturing designer Max Durney and now gaining traction, Industrial Origami has come up with a strong, simple, brilliant, and relatively inexpensive way to build things: By precision folding sheets of aluminum and steel.

Studying Sea Life for a Glue That Mends People Top and bottom left: Fred Hayes/University of Utah; top and bottom right: Russell Stewart STICK-TO-IT-IVENESS Clockwise from top left, the sandcastle worm builds its home by using tentacles to grab sand and shell bits and glues them with adhesive from an organ on its head; its tube-shaped dwelling; two beads of a worm’s home, microscopically enlarged; a section of a sandcastle worm colony.

Graphene could someday replace silicon as a semiconductor material and make our chips smaller and faster, except for one tiny detail: it’s been rather hard to mess with its electronic properties. Until now. “We have experimentally realized and theoretically investigated, for the first time, perfect atomic wires in graphene,” Ivan Oleynik, one of the two University of South Florida professors behind the discovery, told Wired.com. Atomic wires are short chains of atoms that conduct electricity and so far, they have been hard to achieve in graphene.

ntumescent materials expand or swell when they are exposed to heat. Sometimes these materials are used for fire safety. In the case of this ink it is used to create a decorative effect.INVT.render({pid: 'expanding-ink'});This is the most interesting use of intumescent materials we have seen here at Inventables. We're interested to see how well it actually insulates your hand from the hot coffee.

a "plywood replacement" panel material manufactured by British firm Environmental Recycling Technologies.

EcoSheet is manufactured from 75% recycled material, mostly waste electrical and electronic equipment, and can itself be recycled at the end of its useful life.

Researchers at the University of Michigan have unveiled their latest breakthrough:  a tiny solar power system that contains a processor, battery and solar cells all in 9 cubic millimeters! The miniature system measures 2.5 by 3.5 by 1 millimeters -- 1,000 times smaller than any comparable commercial system.  It's extremely energy efficient and the scientists say that it could almost operate perpetually if the battery didn't have to be replaced after many years. The system uses an ARM processor, a popular, widely-used processor which will make commercial adoption of this technology much easier. The system could be remodeled to generate power from movement or heat instead of light, making it fit for a variety of uses.  Like the small, flexible kinetic-energy harvester we profiled a last month, the scientists also see this device serving as a power source for medical implants like pacemakers.  Other possibilities include powering environmental sensors that track air and water quality and motion sensors for buildings, homes and bridges. The good news is that the researchers are already working on commercially developing the system.  With a host of possible applications, who knows where this itty bitty power generator might end up.

elight Cloth is a light-emitting textile comprised of thousands of fiber optic strands. With a diameter of only 0.25 to 0.5 mm, the optical fibers are woven into a large translucent tapestry that can be hung vertically or horizontally. The material may be used for wall or ceiling treatments, as well as banner signage or clothing. Delight Cloth can be fabricated with imbedded graphics or logos, and may be used to emit a wide variety of colors of light. Japan-based Tsuya textile Co., Ltd. developed “The cloth fiber cross which glittered” in cooperation with Fukui engineering center.

mico’s APEX expanded metal mesh offers many benefits such as texture, passage of light, air movement, reduction of solar gain, high strength-to-weight ratio and a variety of manufacturing material options. Carbon steel, galvanized steel, aluminum and stainless steel are commonly used to make expanded mesh, and Amico can also expand alloys such as brass, copper, Cor-ten, and titanium. One of the most striking aspects of expanded mesh is the small amount of raw material required to produce a large amount of product. The expanding method is a slitting and stretching process, which creates a product that is stronger and lighter than its original form and that will not unravel. Amico engineers can custom engineer new mesh designs based on functional requirements.

Researchers have found a way to make flexible silicon solar cells using only 1 percent of the material used in conventional solar cells. The cells are made of micron-sized silicon wires that are encased in a flexible polymer that can be rolled or bent.  The researchers at Cal Tech who developed the cells eventually see them being used in clothing, but, for now, the cells could create cheaper and easier-to-install solar panels. Large consumer electronic companies like Sharp have experimented with organic thin-film solar cells, which are flexible, but they're less efficient than those made with silicon.  This breakthrough is the latest in a recent crop of studies combining the efficiency of silicon (about 15 to 20 percent efficiency) with the flexibility of the organic thin-film cells, but this one has the distinction of using only 1/100th of the amount of silicon per cell as a traditional silicon wafer. An added bonus to this type of solar cell is that existing manufacturing technology could be used to make them, further helping to keep cost down.

A new invention out of the Imperial College of London could forever alter how we think about batteries — and powering cars for that matter. Researchers have patented a mixture of carbon fiber and polymer that can store and discharge electricity, meaning that eventually the body of your car could also be running its engine.