'Ay, there's the rub': Researchers strive to identify the atomic origins of wear
To slide; perchance to fatigue. "Wear is so common in sliding systems that it has acquired this air of inevitability," says Greg Sawyer, a professor in mechanical engineering at the University of Florida who leads a team of researchers hoping to overturn this assumption. Sawyer and his collaborators have succeeded in modifying polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE), the ubiquitous, already low-friction material also known as Teflon, to make it "nearly a million times more wear-resistant." By applying the lessons learned from this and other such success stories, the researchers are attempting to identify, and then eliminate, the atomic and molecular origins of wear. If they reach their goal, moving assemblies such as joint replacements might last, if not forever, then at least until their owners "have shuffled off this mortal coil."