Discoveries News | Discoveries News – Discoveries Information

materials science

04/21/2018 / By Zoey Sky

Crystallized water could exist in Earth’s lower mantle

According to a study, water could be hidden hundreds of miles under the Earth’s surface – but in the form of crystallized water. While oceans have maximum depths of at least seven miles, water is known to exist well below these levels. In fact, ongoing research is still trying to confirm “[just] how deep this hidden […]

04/08/2018 / By David Williams

Scientists develop “nanowood” that works like styrofoam for construction, but it’s lighter and stronger

Insulating materials such as styrofoam and certain types of plastics are certainly useful in many applications, but some of their properties make them a problem for the environment. For this reason, scientists are always on the lookout for alternative materials that can be used to replace them in the future. Now a team of engineers […]

03/20/2018 / By Edsel Cook

Engineers have discovered a way to increase the density of wood, improving its mechanical performance as a structural material

A new pre-treatment process developed by Maryland engineers can produce extremely dense wood with more than 10 times the strength, toughness, ballistic resistance, and dimensional stability of normal wood. The developers claim the specific strength of their processed wood variant exceeds that of most structural metals and titanium alloys while being cheaper than carbon fiber. […]

03/11/2018 / By Frances Bloomfield

Researchers have recycled clothing waste into an “aerogel” supermaterial that can help stop wound bleeding

Cotton-based fabric waste has a multitude of uses that range from being recycled into polishing and wiper clothes to automotive insulation. Though, as researchers from the National University of Singapore (NUS) have discovered and demonstrated, this type of waste could be turned into cotton aerogels that have their own practical applications. The cotton aerogels, which […]

02/22/2018 / By David Williams

MXene: A new miracle material with applications in energy storage, biology, electronics, medicine and more

MXene is a relatively new miracle material that has captured the curiosity of scientists from all over the world. Broadly speaking, it’s so new that you probably haven’t even heard of it yet. But it’s likely to become the basis for many different kinds of innovations in the near future in relation to gadgets and […]

02/21/2018 / By Frances Bloomfield

Smart coating that’s hard like enamel but can self-heal was inspired by human skin

Smart coatings: they’re either too soft and wear down easily, or too hard and offer little room for flexibility. This is a dilemma that researchers from the Harbin Institute of Technology have tackled and attempted to overcome. To that end, the investigative team has come up with a smart coating that possesses both the durability […]

01/25/2018 / By Frances Bloomfield

Self-healing fungi concrete may be a sustainable solution for America’s crumbling infrastructure

A team of researchers from Binghamton University has developed a self-healing fungi concrete. In collaboration with scientists from the State University of New York, the team hopes that their creation can save America’s infrastructure by permanently repairing cracks. The researchers used Trichoderma reesei, a fungus which they mixed with concrete. They discovered that the fungi […]

12/26/2017 / By David Williams

Self-healing glass discovered by scientists accidentally, could lead to end of smashed screens

Ever since smartphone makers thought it was acceptable to build phones with nothing but mostly screens on them, the world has come to know one major annoyance: broken glass screens. Whenever a phone screen breaks, it’s always a toss-up between continuing to use the phone with cracks on its display, or just ponying up for a […]

11/06/2017 / By Rita Winters

Sci-fi in real life: Scientists have developed a “smart fabric” that can store data in your clothes, without electronics

One of the benefits of the modern world is that you get to see and experience inventions that make life easier. You’ve heard about wearable technology like healing gloves and climate-controlled shirts. Another type of smart clothing has just been developed, and it can store data and unlock your doors. At the University of Washington, […]

10/28/2017 / By Michelle Simmons

Flexible, eco-friendly AND less expensive: Researchers are one step closer to the smart screen of the future

Tired of suffering from or replacing a smashed phone screen? Here’s some good news. Researchers at the University of Sussex in England have developed a new smartphone screen material that is less costly, more flexible, and eco-friendly, according to a report by Science Daily. The researchers combined silver nanowires with graphene, which is a two-dimensional carbon […]

1 of 2