Researchers Create Moldable Metals That Are Stronger Than Steel
Plastics are great because they are so easily moldable into just about anything, but that manipulability also often introduces a degree of fragility as well. For high strength and durability, what you really want is a metal alloy of some kind. Now Yale scientists are doing away with this strength-moldability tradeoff by developing novel metal alloys that are as moldable as plastic. The resulting materials are stronger than steel, yet easily formed under low heat and pressure into all kinds of shapes and forms. Materials scientists at Yale were looking into the properties of some recently developed bulk mettalic glasses--metal alloys whose atoms are randomly arranged rather than organized into highly-ordered crystalline structures--and found that they can be blow molded just like plastics while retaining their strength and durability. Related ArticlesLet Burning Metals LieMore Bad News About PlasticsThe Future of PlasticsTagsScience, Clay Dillow, alloys, materials science, metals, plastics, YaleThe alloys--composed of common...