New Material: Strength of Glass, Toughness of Metal

Finding a material with the strength of glass and the toughness of metal has proved impossible up until now.

Glass is strong but tends to shatter easily, while metal resists the shattering but is malleable.

Marios Demetriou, a scientist from Caltech, has married the properties of both glass and metal, creating a new material that doubles the strength and toughness of steel and therefore has great potential. While it is rather expensive at the moment (He used palladium and silver.), Demetriou hopes to duplicate the experiment with metals that cost less.

Checkout the full article at Discover.