Materials comment, January 2013

Stronger and greener concrete from outer space

Researchers have developed a stronger, greener form of concerete made from extra-terrestrial dust, potato starch and a pinch of salt.

Plastic proteins behave just like the real thing

Using artificial intelligence, researchers have designed random heteropolymers that can mimic many of the properties of natural proteins.

Bacteria-loaded ink prints bone-like 3D biocomposites

energy efficient process uses bacteria to produce bone-like porous CaCO3-based composites

The tribovoltaic effect

A strong, lightweight, and damping cermet material with a nacre-like ultrafine 3D interpenetrated architecture