Nearly Hard as Steel: Aluminum with Fullerenes
Friday, July 16, 2010 - 13:07
in Physics & Chemistry
Russian researchers with Siemens Corporate Technology (CT) are using special carbon nanoparticles to optimize materials. They are adding fullerenes -- soccer ball-shaped molecules comprising 60 carbon atoms -- to aluminum to obtain a new material that is roughly three times harder than conventional composites, yet weights much less. The lightweight yet strong aluminum could be used to improve the performance of compressors, turbochargers and engines.