Researchers at MIT and Caltech have created a nanoengineered material that could be tougher than the likes of kevlar or steel. Made of interconnected carbon “tetrakaidecahedrons,” the material absorbed the impact of microscopic bullets in spectacular fashion.
The study, led by MIT’s Carlos Portela, aimed to find out whether nanoarchitected materials — that is, designed and fabricated at the scale of nanometers — could be a viable path toward ultratough blast shields, body armor and other protective surfaces.
The idea of tetrakaidecahedron-based materials, however, isn’t a new one. The complex 14-sided class of polyhedron (there are about 1.5 billion possible variations) …
