Ceramic can be non-breakable

Researchers have developed a technology that can lead to production of a material that is thermally insulating but also extremely light-weight and non-breakable.

The team of researchers from California Institute of Technology in the US has developed the method by taking advantage of the unusual properties that solids exhibit at the nanometer scale, where features are measured in billionths of metres.

"The applications of this technique are practically limitless," said Julia Greer, a professor of materials science and mechanics.

With the method, researchers demonstrated that a ceramic that contains about 99.9 percent air can be made incredibly strong and made to recover to its original shape after being smashed by over 50 percent.

A ceramic is an inorganic, non-metallic solid prepared by the action of heat and subsequent cooling.

"Ceramics have always been thought to be heavy and brittle," Greer said.

"If you use the concept of the nano-scale to create structures and then use those nano-structures to construct larger materials, you can obtain nearly any set of properties you want," she added.

To prove this, researchers used a direct laser writing method called two-photon lithography to "write" a three-dimensional pattern in a polymer by allowing a laser beam to cross-link and harden the polymer wherever it is focused.

The parts of the polymer that were exposed to the laser remain intact while the rest dissolved away, revealing a three-dimensional scaffold.

Then the researchers used another method to etch out the polymer from within the structure, leaving a hollow architecture.

Since pretty much any material can be deposited on the scaffolds, the method could be particularly useful for applications in optics, energy efficiency and bio-medicine.

For example, it could be used to reproduce complex structures such as bone, producing a scaffold out of bio-compatible materials on which cells could proliferate.

The study appeared in the journal Science.