Easy-to-Make Material Scratches Diamond

holy_calamity writes "A material tough enough to scratch diamond that can be made without resorting to massive pressure has been developed at UCLA. A regular furnace and a zap of current is enough to meld boron with the metal rhenium." Sound familiar? This is the other new material tougher than diamond, but no word yet on how they rate against each other.

Comments

Re:Hardness, stiffness, and toughness

[Paradise Pete]

the author said that I had basically ruined his life by wrecking the whole concept of the book that he had been writing for the last few years. In subsequent emails, he was begging me to come up with a solution

If he can't figure out a solution to that I'm guessing the rest of the book ain't gonna be all that hot.

I wonder?

[Paracelcus]

If it could be incorporated into a matrix of buckytubes, it could be a great laminating material for armor.

Re:Obligatory...

[Phanatic1a]

God, I wish this dumb myth would die.

So do I. There are still other reasons it's dumb.

First, the argument goes, as stated by the parent poster, that "and because his buddies will be busy rescuing him instead of fighting." Except they won't. Troops aren't trained to put down their guns and stop fighting back to rescue wounded. The other argument goes that it ties up the other guy's resources in getting him to a hospital, fixing him, caring for him, and so forth. But that only matters if *you* lose the battle. If you *win*, you're now in possession of all those wounded, and now *you* have to care for them. Then there's the fact that there are all sorts of wounds that allow the wounded to not only keep fighting, but to return to the front to fight again after some medical care.

It's a dumb myth.