Feb.4, 2014
Material scientist Jens Bauer and a team at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) in Germany have taken human bone as inspiration in developing a strong, lightweight material made using 3D laser lithography. The new 3D printed material has a higher strength-to-weight ratio than all engineering materials and has a density lower than water.
Materials literally give shape our world. One of the goals of material scientists is to make materials that are high in strength and low in density. Strength and density have an inverse relationship in material engineering: as things become stronger, they become heavier.
In fact, all known materials may be represented on one chart with lightweight, weak materials such as foam presented at one end of the continuum and heavier, strong materials such as metals and ceramics at the other.
Each line means the strength or density of the material goes up by ten. The density of water is located in the middle of the chart at 1000kg/m3. No solid material is lighter than water unless it is porous – this can be seen in the chart above where only honeycombs, foams, woods, and some plastics appear to the left of the 1000kg/m3 density line.
Naturally occurring porous materials such as bone or wood are inspiration for material scientists, but the complex microstructures in these natural materials have been impossible to replicate.
Enter 3D printing.
New developments in lasers and 3D printing technology have given material scientists like Bauer and his team new tools to use realize material design concepts. Using special lasers developed by Nanoscribe, a spinoff of KIT, the Bauer and his team used a technique called 3D laser lithography which uses tiny laser beam and special lenses to create structures in light-sensitive polymer.
The polymer was then covered in an aluminum compound to create the ten airy, repeating, bone-like patterns seen below.
Bauer and his team used stress tests to find the material structure with the highest strength-to-weight ratio.
The strongest material had an internal honeycomb structure and was coated with a 50 nanometer layer of alumina. It is able to withstand pressure up to 280 mega pascals which makes it the strongest man-made material that is lighter than water.
Nanoscribe's current system makes objects that are tens of micrometers in size. As laser, 3D printing, and material technologies improve, possibilities exist for real-life applications for new superstrong, lightweight materials.
Find the Bauer's full paper published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences here.
Sources: Gigaom
Posted in 3D Printing Applications
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