Nanotechnology for Bridge Protection
26 December 2007, 13:18
Categories: polymers smart-materials-smt
A new research initiative at the Department of Homeland Security will explore the uses of nanotechnology for bridge protection. “We’re looking for blast resistance, projectile resistance and a bunch of other unique properties,” says Mary Ellen Hynes, the director of the research.
One of the long-range possibilities is a bridge that can heal itself; it is an idea that may sound far-fetched, but it is already the focus of widespread research. A major breakthrough in self-healing materials occurred in 2001, when Scott White and his colleagues at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign created a self-healing polymer containing tiny capsules of a simple monomer. When cracks appear in the material, the capsules break open, allowing the monomer to come into contact with a catalyst that turns the monomer into a polymer, filling and repairing its own cracks.
Since then, researchers have developed other self-healing approaches, and roadways and bridges are considered one possible major application. The primary goal is to seal fatigue cracks as they appear, and prevent salt and water from entering cracks and corroding the bridge, with healing timescales ranging from a few minutes to a few hours, White says. In the face of a bomb blast, self-healing action could help stabilize the rest of the structure, sealing cracks and preventing the local damage from taking out the rest of the bridge. But that would require a reaction on the scale of seconds. “There are certainly some chemistries that work ultrafast,” White says, “but that’s a long time down the road.”
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Posted by: The Editors
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