A LATEST research from experts from the Texas-based Rice University has led to rhe discovery for developing self healing materials.
The findings, which involve squeezing a piece of silicone that would quickly return to its original shape, could lead to new strategies for self-healing materials or biocompatible materials that mimic human tissues. Moreover, the liquid crystal phase of silicone is found to become 90% stiffer when silicone is gently and repeatedly compressed.
Silicone in its liquid crystal phase is somewhere between a solid and liquid state, which makes it very useful for various applications.
The researchers said that they had intended to quantify results seen from previous study done by a former Rice graduate student, who subjected a nanotube-infused polymer to a process called repetitive dynamic compression, which involves doing 3.5 million compressions (5/sec) over a week toughened the material by 12%.