Each week, we spotlight a cool innovation recommended by some of the industry's top tech writers. This week's pick is a newly invented material, metallic wood.
"A newly invented material has the strength of titanium, however, it's light enough to float on water," said Jennifer Pattison Tuohy at Dwell. The University of Pennsylvania scientists who developed the material call it "metallic wood" because, like wood, it is porous. Some parts are thick and dense and "hold the structure."
It was made by coating plastic spheres with nickel, then dissolving the plastic, leaving a super-strong porous metal structure. The new material is 70 percent empty space; researchers say that in the future they could create variants that fill the space with energy-storing material to create super light batteries — or even with living organisms that could give it biological properties.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Home Depots are the new epicenters of ICE raidsIn the Spotlight The chain has not provided many comments on the ongoing raids
-
Why does Trump keep interfering in the NYC mayoral race?Today's Big Question The president has seemingly taken an outsized interest in his hometown elections, but are his efforts to block Zohran Mamdani about political expediency or something deeper?
-
The pros and cons of banning cellphones in classroomsPros and cons The devices could be major distractions
