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posted by Fnord666 on Friday February 09 2018, @06:10AM   Printer-friendly
from the breakfast-of-super-termites dept.

Engineers at the University of Maryland, College Park (UMD) have found a way to make wood more than 10 times times stronger and tougher than before, creating a natural substance that is stronger than many titanium alloys.

"This new way to treat wood makes it 12 times stronger than natural wood and 10 times tougher," said Liangbing Hu of UMD's A. James Clark School of Engineering and the leader of the team that did the research, to be published on February 8, 2018 in the journal Nature. "This could be a competitor to steel or even titanium alloys, it is so strong and durable. It's also comparable to carbon fiber, but much less expensive." Hu is an associate professor of materials science and engineering and a member of the Maryland Energy Innovation Institute.

The process seems to hinge on fine-tuning the amount of lignin present in the wood.

An abstract is available but the full article is paywalled; Journal Reference:

Jianwei Song, Chaoji Chen, Shuze Zhu, Mingwei Zhu, Jiaqi Dai, Upamanyu Ray, Yiju Li, Yudi Kuang, Yongfeng Li, Nelson Quispe, Yonggang Yao, Amy Gong, Ulrich H. Leiste, Hugh A. Bruck, J. Y. Zhu, Azhar Vellore, Heng Li, Marilyn L. Minus, Zheng Jia, Ashlie Martini, Teng Li, Liangbing Hu. Processing bulk natural wood into a high-performance structural material. Nature, 2018; 554 (7691): 224 DOI: 10.1038/nature25476


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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by anubi on Friday February 09 2018, @08:13AM (11 children)

    by anubi (2828) on Friday February 09 2018, @08:13AM (#635439) Journal

    Is this still sensitive to water, termites, and rot?

    And as far as that Chinese steel, wasn't it US who could not even refine the steel of the WTC, as our own steel plants lay rusting away in the Northeast, surrounded by unemployed steelmen surviving off the checks printed by loaning Congress money... while we apparently are investing our resources in cryptomining!

    I guess one has to be wearing a really good executive suit before any of this makes sense.

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  • (Score: 3, Informative) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Friday February 09 2018, @09:49AM (9 children)

    by GreatAuntAnesthesia (3275) on Friday February 09 2018, @09:49AM (#635457) Journal

    Regular wood is used extensively in building, and water, termites & rot aren't considered major problems. Presumably whatever chemical treatments we currently use to defend against those would still be applicable.
    It might even be that the very strength of the wood would be sufficient to turn away a termite's jaws, but IANAEntymologist so who knows.

    A crucial point from TFA not found in TFS: This stuff is only one sixth the weight of steel. That's a BIG deal for engineers. This could be good not only for civil engineering, but for vehicular engineering too.

    • (Score: 1) by ewk on Friday February 09 2018, @10:10AM (1 child)

      by ewk (5923) on Friday February 09 2018, @10:10AM (#635461)

      "This could be good not only for civil engineering, but for vehicular engineering too."

      Yeah, but I think that was sort of already implied by the quote "It's also comparable to carbon fiber, but much less expensive" in the TFS :-)

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      • (Score: 2) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Friday February 09 2018, @11:36AM

        by GreatAuntAnesthesia (3275) on Friday February 09 2018, @11:36AM (#635467) Journal

        Yeah that's my own bias showing through. I read TFS and immediately my mind went to structural engineering - buildings and bridges and such. Vehicular was an afterthought. TFS and TFA show no such prejudice.

    • (Score: 2, Interesting) by anubi on Friday February 09 2018, @10:19AM (1 child)

      by anubi (2828) on Friday February 09 2018, @10:19AM (#635463) Journal

      I was just thinking of the problems I am seeing at a 100 year old church. It was completely re-done. There was extensive wood damage to beams that were inaccessible for maintenance and treatment. My neighbor's house also had a bit of termite damage in the walls.

      Maybe we do have treatments that actually work. It seems that by the time its "approved", it was done so through sufficient bribery to pass something proven completely safe, to termite and human alike, and the "good" stuff is kept under wraps. Like those diet pills advertised on TV that are patented and approved by the FDA. What they did not say is that grass clippings would qualify for those certifications. The FDA never claimed they work... rather they claim they won't hurt you. And anything can be patented. Patent number whatever: Means and method for selling grass clippings for high profit margin.

      The stuff looks good, but so did that "sunwood" "treated" 4X6 Home Depot sold me about 20 years ago. Its rotten, the fence is falling down. I am going to have to replace it. Not so bad for an outdoor fence, but had that been main support members for a WalMart, I am sure someone would be royally pissed. The local grocery store has some decorative wood trim outside that is already falling apart. Don't even talk to me about a wooden patio cover I am going to have to replace.

      Now, my pipe rack, made with "untreated" lumber is just fine... I did a homebrew on that one and painted it with used motor oil. The termites haven't touched it.

      I hear "wood", I can't help but remember all the disappointments I have had.

      A concrete and steel structure seems to go on indefinitely until torn down, but a wooden barn will fall down all by itself if ignored.

      --
      "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
      • (Score: 5, Interesting) by GreatAuntAnesthesia on Friday February 09 2018, @10:46AM

        by GreatAuntAnesthesia (3275) on Friday February 09 2018, @10:46AM (#635465) Journal

        Well, your hundred year old church wouldn't have been built with modern, treated woods. And the wood you use for your fence is not the same stuff that goes into holding up a building. What's more, your fence has to deal with a lot more weather than something that is buried deep in the structure of a building.

        My house is well over a hundred years old, for example, and all the joists and beams are in fine condition now despite the awful British weather and generations of internal changes to the building. In fact I'd say the wood is lasting better than the bricks, but again, the bricks are the ones taking the brunt of the weather.

        Modern steel and concrete structures typically have a lifetime measured in decades, maybe a century. Admittedly that tends to be a deliberate cost trade off at the design stage, rather than anything inherent to the materials themselves. Plenty of the stuff that went up in the fifties and sixties is rusting and crumbling now. Meanwhile there are countless buildings still standing on centuries-old timbers. Hell, you can't spit in this country without hitting some five-hundred year old pub or clergyman's cottage with the original timbers still holding it up.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 09 2018, @12:22PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 09 2018, @12:22PM (#635479)

      Borax in propylene glycol soaked into the wood to kill termites

    • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday February 09 2018, @01:43PM

      by JoeMerchant (3937) on Friday February 09 2018, @01:43PM (#635494)

      It might even be that the very strength of the wood would be sufficient to turn away a termite's jaws, but IANAEntymologist so who knows.

      Some termites need wet wood to feed on and only thrive is specific circumstances. Formosan termites will chew through solid concrete to get to wood for feeding.

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    • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 09 2018, @03:44PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 09 2018, @03:44PM (#635527)
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 10 2018, @07:03AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 10 2018, @07:03AM (#635912)

        Note to webmasters worldwide: this is a great way to title your anchors.

    • (Score: 2) by HiThere on Friday February 09 2018, @06:45PM

      by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Friday February 09 2018, @06:45PM (#635642) Journal

      Umnhhh.... I don't know about rot, though dry rot can silently destroy a structural member, but termites can be a real danger even in a three story building. Anything taller, and if the lower level gets eaten away you're likely to have a sudden major collapse without warning.

      The thing about anti-termite treatments is that they commonly depend on infusing something into the structure of the wood. That's going to interfere with the regularity of the grain. OTOH, if it's dry enough on the inside (maybe) then you should be able to sheathe it in, oh, Varathane(R), to keep them out. This isn't a standard treatment, but it ought to work, but you'd need to be sure that only the surface layer was affected. (That shouldn't be a problem, but I don't know the grain structure of this thing.)

      So it should be possible to with the problems, but not in the usual ways. IF they can keep the rot spores out before they seal the surface.

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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by c0lo on Friday February 09 2018, @11:56AM

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Friday February 09 2018, @11:56AM (#635472) Journal

    Is this still sensitive to water, termites, and rot?

    Grey ironbak [ironwood.com.au] - does not float (specific weight 1120kg/m3) and is not attacked by termites or lyctid borers - too much lignin, not enough cellulose.

    I've seen peer posts 100+ years old made of this wood - can't call them "as new" but certainly having some other tens of years ahead.

    ---

    The tree is not poisonous, but it will kill if it hits you when falling.
    I heard from park rangers that many young age (and still underweight) drop bears make their drop together with an ironbark log as a helper.

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