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Scientists Turn Gold Into Foam That's Nearly As Light As Air (www.ethz.ch)
Zothecula writes: Along with its use in jewelry, gold also has numerous applications in fields such as electronics and scientific research. It's a handy material, but – of course – it's also expensive. That's why researchers at ETH Zurich have developed a new way of making a small amount of gold go a long way. They've created a gold foam that looks much like solid gold, but is actually 98 parts air and two parts solid material (abstract). As an added bonus, the aerogel-type foam can also be made in non-gold colors such as dark red.
Step 1) Turn gold into foam.
Step 2) Make gold look red.
Step 3)....
Step 4) Loss!
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I think the market is under-served by not having non-gold gold.
The implications for the hip-hop and gold-tooth industries are staggering, as suddenly bling is no longer confined to being gold, but can be other non-gold colors.
People have been saying for years that gold should come in other colors, as gold was just too damned boring.
When asked if creating non-gold gold would create confusion among buyers of gold, as well as creating higher change of fraud due to non-gold-gold gold being produced to be represented as non-gold gold, representatives declined comment citing they were not authorized to speculate on such drivel.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Nonetheless, that's actually pretty neat.
"With patience a ruler may be persuaded, and a soft tongue will break a bone."
A pound of gold or a pound of feathers?
The idea of creating a material that is mostly air isn't particularly impressive. The technique of actually doing it is where it gets clever, and the technique used here to make this gold foam is not the same as the techniques used to create the familiar aerogels. FTA:
"The method chosen, in which the gold particles are crystallised directly during manufacture of the aerogel protein structure (and not, for example, added to an existing scaffold) is new. The method's biggest advantage is that it makes it easy to obtain a homogeneous gold aerogel, perfectly mimicking gold alloys."
If the same scientists used bitcoin the final material would have been 100% hot air.
Stop thinking gold is a suitable alternative!
You DO realize that TFS even mentions aerogel, right? And that it's mentioned like 5 times in TFA?
NOBODY is claiming this is a 100% new idea, they're saying they've managed to do it with gold, and that they can influence the color based on how they do some of the steps.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I think somebody was a bit drunk when reading the basics of Alchemy...
Pah. Doctor Bunsen Honeydew and Beaker were decades ahead of them - gold into foam? Useless! Try gold into cottage cheese - low in cholesterol, high in vitamins...
About the density of balsa wood
dear AC,
Your gold density is wrong.
Sincerely,
Chem. prof. (now quit slacking off!)
sigs are for losers (except to point out that sigs are for losers)
The first metals known to humans came from meteorites falling to earth, and droplets of mercury that were seen running out of stones as they were heated. So it would have been an easy assumption that heating rocks produces metals.
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
Nice feat, but does this also have a practical usage, or is this a purely academic exercise? From the article: 'But in contrast to its conventional form, it is soft and malleable by hand' - so not quite usable for jewelry. Where gold is used for its conductivity, it is mostly used as plating, not as solid or foamy object. So ... what am I missing?
"Sarge, we couldn't find any contraband on the smugglers. They are only exporting pillows this time."
Table-ized A.I.
Does the conductivity change?
Yes.
Next.
I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
This will make it even more profitable to salt mines before leading "investors" through...
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
At 98% air you can crush it by hand. It would probably come off in chunks if you tried to scratch it.
Federal Reserve, plz go.
Have gnu, will travel.
I wonder heavy metal foams would be a good lightweight radiation shield? At first blush you would think it is weight/density dependent but if you have to wonder if radiation aligns itself with the 'holes' between the atoms.
love is just extroverted narcissism
Actually if radiation is aligned with a crystal lattice it interacts even more with the material and the radiation length (the distance travelled before 1/e of the particles interact on average) gets shorter. However this only happens if the radiation is aligned to within a few milli-radians of the symmetry axis of the crystal (and most metal you encounter is not a single crystal). I actually measured this effect as part of my PhD thesis for an application in the main particle physics experiment I was working on.
So no, this material will probably be no more effective than the same mass of gold in a thin, but solid, sheet. Radiation shielding with matter is a statistical affair and the fewer nuclei you have the less shielding you get. I'm also surprised that they suggest a use in jewelry since they also describe it as easily malleable, far more so than solid gold. Still it is interesting.
I wonder if they will accept it for purchases at Dairy Queen.
Stasis is death. Embrace change.
This stuff is very different from Aerogel. I bought some Aerogel on eBay for my daughter's science project. Aerogel is very rigid and fragile. It can fracture just from normal handling. According to TFA, this gold foam is malleable, and can be bent and shaped by hand. That would make it very different from old fashioned Aerogel, and suitable for different applications. Supposedly, Aerographene is also elastic.