Strong Light and Stretchy

Copying nature: A cross section of mother-of-pearl, or nacre, shows calcium carbonate platelets arranged in layers separated by a biopolymer (top). Researchers have mimicked nacre’s structure by dispersing aluminum oxide platelets in the biopolymer chitosan (bottom), which yields a nanocomposite that is strong, stretchy, and light. Credit: J. Woltersdorf and E. Pippel, MPI for Microstructure Physics, Halle, Germany

Researchers have dispersed tiny platelets of aluminum oxide in a polymer to make a material that is tough, stretchy, and lightweight. The material could lead to longer-lasting bone and dental implants and lighter, more fuel-efficient car and airplane parts. It could also be used to make bendable, transparent electronics.

In their efforts to create strong yet light materials, chemists and materials scientists have long tried to mimic nanostructures found in nature. Shells, bones, and tooth enamel all consist of stiff ceramic platelets arranged in a polymer matrix like bricks in mortar. These hybrid materials combine the strength of ceramics and the stretchability of polymers.

In 2007, University of Michigan researchers engineered clay-reinforced polymers that were extremely strong but brittle: it takes a lot of energy to deform them, but when they do deform, they break abruptly. Researchers at MIT succeeded in making stiff but less brittle clay-polymer composites, which will tolerate some stretching before they break. (See "Ultra-Tough Nanotech Materials.")

Ludwig Gauckler, the professor of materials at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich, in Switzerland, who led the new work, says that his group's composite is better still. It's five times as strong as the material made at MIT, he says, yet it's still stretchy. A film of the composite is already as strong as aluminum foil, Gauckler says, but if stretched, it can expand by up to 25 percent of its size; aluminum foil would break at 2 percent.

An added advantage of the hybrid material is that it's light, says Harvard materials scientist Andre Studart, who was involved in the work. The material is half to a quarter as heavy as steel of the same strength, Studart says, and it would make a good substitute for fiberglass, which is commonly used in car parts. Because the material's strength comes from the platelets diffused through it, Studart says, "it will be strong in two directions and not only in one direction, as in the case of fiber-reinforced material."

Moreover, while the material is translucent now, its structure could be modified to render it transparent, making it suitable for dental material and transparent electronic circuits.

To assemble their material, the researchers disperse aluminum oxide platelets in ethanol and spread the mixture over water. The platelets arrange themselves into a single layer on the surface of the water. Then the researchers dip a glass plate into the solution, transferring the platelets to the glass. Finally, they deposit a layer of the biocompatible polymer chitosan on top of the platelets. The researchers repeat this process until the thickness of the final composite is a few tens of micrometers, and then they peel the material off the glass plate with a razor blade.

In designing the material, the researchers carefully studied the mechanical structure of nacre, the shiny layer on the inside of seashells, and tried to improve it. Nacre has platelets made of calcium carbonate arranged in layers inside a protein-based polymer. "There's something very special about the size of these platelets," Studart says. "Nacre uses specific platelet length and thickness to achieve the high strength and [stretchability] that you see in metals."