Military Develops Liquid Body Armor

kai5263499 writes "Military.com has an article about a new liquid body armor the U.S. Army Research Laboratory has developed. According to Dr. Eric Wetzel, the project coordinator: 'The key component of liquid armor is a shear thickening fluid. STF is composed of hard particles suspended in a liquid. The liquid, polyethylene glycol, is non-toxic, and can withstand a wide range of temperatures. Hard, nano-particles of silica are the other components of STF. This combination of flowable and hard components results in a material with unusual properties'."

Comments

Screenshots.

[monstroyer]

No screen shots on the linked page, but i work as personel in the michigan militia and have set up some servers to show you what the armor in action looks like.

• Man in liquid armor walking down the lab hallway.
  This is joey, the lab assistant, going on a coffee run.
  
• Man in liquid armor enduring heat.
  This test killed a few of our volunteers, but after many tries we finally worked out all the kinks.
• Liquid armor on half a face
  We do half the face in case the armor blinds the test subject, at least he'll have one good eye left. (Lessons learned from the "heat" test, we apply the same principal for the genitals as well.)

Your tax dollars at work.

Countermeasures

[Anonymous Coward]

Lots of salt or huge silica gel packets.

Next James Bond Movie!

[radiumhahn]

In the next james bond movie they will use this stuff in breast implants to make SUPER boobs.

Bulletproof Inners

[salmonz]

Does this non-toxie liquid stuff mean that if I were to drink it, I would be bulletproof? Wicked!

Re:Polyethylene Glycol?

[Sexy Bern]

Any chemist worth his salt would be able to answer that.

The question of the future

[serutan]

"We would first like to put this material in a soldier's sleeves and pants..."

So the hookers of the future will ask soldiers, "Is that shear-thickening liquid armor in your pants, or are you just glad to see me?"