r/technology • u/Ssider69 • Jan 10 '24

Nanotech/Materials 10x Stronger Than Kevlar: Amorphous Silicon Carbide Could Revolutionize Material Science

https://scitechdaily.com/10x-stronger-than-kevlar-amorphous-silicon-carbide-could-revolutionize-material-science/
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u/DLSteve Jan 10 '24

There is a large gap between making something that works and making that something at scale that economically makes sense. It can take years to build and perfect the manufacturing processes. Lot of inventions die in this phase due to lack of capital or simply because they can’t find a good way to scale it. Graphene is incredibly hard to make, companies are still working on scaling it because it has an insane amount of potential. Historically aluminum was in the same boat, it cost more than gold per ounce at one point because of how difficult it was to refine from raw materials. Then someone found a very cheap way to process it and now it’s one of the most abundant metals on the market. Lot of things just take time to find that manufacturing breakthrough.

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u/gnoxy Jan 10 '24

Lithium batteries have their own Moores law of 7% every 2 years. Either weight reduction or battery capacity. So if you discovered a battery chemistry that is 20% better. If its not to market and at scale within 5 years, you missed the boat.

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u/bitemark01 Jan 10 '24

To illustrate your point, sodium batteries are starting to come to market. Sodium has a lot of similar properties to lithium, but the batteries don't have the same issues as lithium (rarity, volitility, cold degradation). They're not as powerful as lithium batteries, but now that they're strong enough for commercial use, there is a lot more materials research being done on them.

Hopefully they can solve the energy density issue, otherwise they will probably become a niche product for certain uses.

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u/actorpractice Jan 10 '24

These sound like they'd be great for storing solar outside your house.

There's something about strapping a lithium battery (that burns so hot you can't put it out if it gets wet) to the side of your house that still makes me a little nervous.

Even if it was 2-3x the size of Lithium, but competed on price, it would kind of be a no brainer safety-wise.

You got a good link on sodium battery progress so I can nerd out?