A new miracle material has been developed by a team of scientists that will soon turn simple T-shirts into sturdy armour.
These scientists have developed the flexible T-shirts to be strong enough to stop speeding bullets.
The fabric is made from the same material used in tank armour, a material produced by combining carbon with the world's third-hardest material.
Xiaodong Li, from the University of Carolina, along with a team of researchers came up with the idea of mixing one of the strongest materials in existence with one of the softest and most supple, namely cotton.
The
process involves the T-shirts being treated with boron and then heated to more than 1000C in an oven, changing fibres in the T-shirt from cotton to carbon.
After a reaction between the boron and carbon fibres, boron carbide is produced - the material that tank armour and bulletproof plates in armoured vests are made from.
"It could even be used to produce lightweight, fuel-efficient cars and aircrafts," Prof Li
said.
Despite being somewhat stiffer and less bendable than normal T-shirts the resulting material is still flexible enough to by worn normally.
"We expect that the nanowires can capture a bullet," Xiaodong Li, wrote in the journal
Advanced Materials.
The uses of the T-shirts go far beyond simply blocking bullets however.
The
boron carbide in the T-shirts is also used in numerous nuclear applications such as shielding and in control rods.
"Almost all" ultraviolet rays as well as life-threatening neutrons that are usually emitted from decaying radioactive substances could be blocked by the T-shirt, Prof Li said.
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/290556