Scientists carry out important studies for many products and materials that will make our lives easier. As a matter of fact, the productions that emerged in the direction of science make very important contributions to life in general. The ‘super jelly’ produced by scientists from Cambridge University seems to have a special place among these productions.
Researchers have developed a material that can withstand external influences and weights, but stays as a soft jelly in its normal state. This super jelly can withstand the equivalent of an elephant, or even higher. 80% of this material is made up of water and the remainder is a polymer network.
Biomedical and can be used in many fields
The part of the material other than water controls the mechanical properties of the material. This soft but extremely strong material has the potential to be used in soft robotics, bioelectronics, biomedical and many other important and critical areas. This new material produced returns to its original state, even if a large weight passes over it.
Making a statement about this product, the results of which were published in the journal Nature Materials, the first author of the study, Dr. “We use cross-linkers where two molecules are joined by a chemical bond to make materials with the mechanical properties we want,” says Zehuan Huang. “We use reversible crosslinkers to make soft and flexible hydrogels, but making a rigid and compressible hydrogel is difficult and designing a material with these properties is completely counterintuitive.”
“You’d think this 80 percent water content material would burst like a water balloon, but it doesn’t. It stays solid and withstands great compression forces,” said Scherman, Director of the Melville Polymer Synthesis Laboratory at Cambridge University. Researchers are striving for this material to be used in many fields.
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