Scientists Develop New Type of Steel That Can Hold Up a Car with just a Fingernail-Sized Piece
Photo credit: Konstantin Makarenko | Skoltech via SCMP
Scientists from Northeastern University in Shenyang in China have developed a new kind of steel that is not only extremely strong, but also stretchable. A fingernail-sized piece can reportedly hold up a 2-ton car without facturing, thanks to its ability to stretch by up to 25%. Creating this material required the team to melt raw alloyed material at 650-800&Deg; degrees Celsius and let it air cool, resulting in the special structure.
This structure then needs to be cooled further using liquid nitrogen, before it is heat treated at 300&Deg; Celsius to improve its stability. Most importantly, manufacturing this new type of steel could potentially reduce the cost of producing a ton by around $75 USD, while also cutting the coal equivalent carbon emissions by over 100kg.
The associated processes proposed in our study – especially the forging procedures – have long been widely used in many companies and production environments to produce parts like axes, ship shafts and so on. There is already large-scale ship shaft with a tonnage scale based on the forging. Our process is consistent with its preparation with only a few adjustments in some process parameters,” said Li Yunjie, Lead Author and postdoctoral researcher at Northeastern University’s State Key Laboratory.
