In these examples, a common strategy is the fusion of soft and hard elements (porous materials are considered an extreme case). Spider webs are such an example, with the web consisting of hard radial ...

Spiders and silkworms are masters of materials science, but scientists are finally catching up. Silks are among the toughest materials known, stronger and less brittle, pound for pound, than steel.

The strength–ductility trade-off has been a long-standing dilemma in materials science. This has limited the potential of many structural materials, steels in particular. Here we report a way of ...

Graphene is the strongest material in the world, according to new experiments done by researchers at Columbia University in the US. The secret to the material’s extraordinary strength, says the team, ...

With industrialization gaining momentum in the United States and new construction sprouting up everywhere shortly after the end of the Civil War, there was a growing need for better ways to test the ...