Nature is replete with slender filaments that bend and coil—from climbing grape vines, to folded proteins, to elephant trunks that can pick up a peanut but also take down a tree.

Natural materials like bone, bird feathers and wood have an intelligent approach to physical stress distribution, despite their irregular architectures. However, the relationship between stress ...

Scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) and their collaborators have created a new class of programmable soft materials that can absorb impacts like never before, while also ...

This is a summary of a story that originally appeared on the Pratt School of Engineering. Mechanical engineers at Duke University have made a breakthrough in programmable materials that can be ...

A University of Amsterdam-led study has found that increasing the activity of microscopic components in certain active materials can actually reduce their large-scale mechanical response. Experiments ...

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Framework for nanoscale material design using programmable DNA systems enables precise control over structure, function, and immune signaling in soft materials. (Nanowerk Spotlight) Nucleic acids ...

MIT's Self-Assembly Lab has developed materials that can be programmed to transform their shape autonomously -- from flexible carbon fibre and hybrid plastics to wood grains and textiles. Skylar ...

Definition: Programmable Matter refers to materials that can change their physical properties (shape, density, modality, conductivity) in real-time, based on user input or autonomous sensing. This ...

HAVE IDEAS ABOUT BOTH, FROM SPECIAL FILMS THAT ADAPT TO CHANGES IN HEAT. THE REALLY GREAT THING ABOUT THIS IS IT COULD BECOME, YOU KNOW, A SHADING SYSTEM. SO IT’S REALLY EASY TO RETROFIT ONTO EXISTING ...

Mechanical engineers at Duke University have demonstrated a proof-of-concept method for programming mechanical properties into solid Lego-like building blocks. By controlling the solidity of hundreds ...

University of Illinois Urbana-Champaig researchers show their 3D-printed resin prototype of the new bio-inspired material, here attached to a synthetic model of a fractured human femur. Credit: Fred ...