‘Liquid armor’ based on shear-thickening non-Newtonian fluids

Computers & Mobile Craft & Design Science
‘Liquid armor’ based on shear-thickening non-Newtonian fluids

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Speaking broadly, non-Newtonian fluids are of two types: Either they get thinner under shear, or they get thicker. Shear-thickening fluids, like the common corn flour-water mixture sometimes called “oobleck,” obviously, get thicker when a force is applied. This new and highly secretive non-Newtonian fluid formulation by British defense giant BAE is like oobleck to the power of ten, and can, reportedly, be very effectively combined with Kevlar to improve human body armor performance against bullets. [via Fast Company]

6 thoughts on “‘Liquid armor’ based on shear-thickening non-Newtonian fluids

  1. Ben says:

    Oobleck is corn starch and water. Corn flour and water is a tortilla.

  2. Sean Michael Ragan says:

    Cornflour may be:

    * Cornmeal, flour ground from dried corn
    * Cornstarch, the white, powdered starch of the maize grain (in UK usage, cornflour normally has this particular meaning)
    * Masa, the flour of hominy
    * Wheat starch, in Australia

    1. phyllis j hammer says:

      Thank you for helping me !!!

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I am descended from 5,000 generations of tool-using primates. Also, I went to college and stuff. I am a long-time contributor to MAKE magazine and makezine.com. My work has also appeared in ReadyMade, c't – Magazin für Computertechnik, and The Wall Street Journal.

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