I mean, realistically most people don’t use body armor or space gear, but we all have a phone. Using this technology for something practical for everyday use doesn’t detract from its usefulness in other, more glamorous situations.
Football helmets work just fine. The issue is the brain hitting the inside of the skull. They would be better off without helmets because they wouldn’t hit so hard. Rugby doesn’t have nearly the kind of brain damage issues they have in football. More cuts, bruises, broken noses, etc. I’d take that over a concussion. Don’t really want either, but at least you won’t develop neurological problems from a crooked nose.
Suddenly, science fiction with aliens whose entire infrastructure is made from organic chitin - from armor, to weapons, to buildings, and even space ships - doesn't seem so exotic.
Football helmets, even with the above technology, can only protect against skull fractures. They are unable to protect against concussions. There simply isn't enough room to decelerate slowly enough to stop the brain from impacting the inside of the skull.
Why? What's making it decelerate? Apparently something *inside* the skull and not the collision with the other person, because that's all happening outside.
So… a solution would be for footballers to have larger helmets?
I would totally watch a match with all the players looking like Toads from Super Mario!
Larger helmets means more mass and leverage on already fragile necks. You'd need something like a [HANS device](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HANS_device) too, but now you're adding mass and leverage to fragile lower backs and knees.
Human beings aren't built for impact sports.
We really should just come back to football once we've got remote pilotable athletic robots.
Get rid of helmets. All padding actually. It allows for much harder hits. No padding would be safer because they would not plow into each other as hard.
Unless the NFL decides to start rotating helmets after every play, no.
Helmets that are designed to stop concussions don’t really exist because if you’re in a situation where you need a helmet, you probably want it to save your life above anything else.
We already know how to make concussion mitigating head protection, it’s just bubble wrap.
I reckon if American football was played without helmets it would be better. We’d see players be more conscious of where they put their heads in the tackle and less likely to dive head first into players.
Yes but we still have smarter tackle technique than a lot of NFL players. You can even see in the “no pad” leagues in America it’s still “safer” than with pads
Nowhere, in any of the linked sources (which included the preprint paper), is anything said about the thickness of the material used in the test. The results are pretty spectacular, but if it adds an inch or two to body armor it’d be nearly useless in that application. Same goes for something as simple as a smartphone case. This will, ***absolutely***, have legitimate use applications but the article seems to be sensationalizing what reality might come of this discovery a bit.
Yes hydrogels are great and can be very tough but as they are mainly water they are heavy, and useless for most protective applications. They also dry out if not hermetically sealed. In the present research the proteins have long term stability issues, and the hydrogel would be useless in space (one of the suggested applications) as it would freeze. Interesting article but not obviously commercial
Not to mention that anything made of gel is sensitive chemically and thermally. Remember the dragonscale gel pack armor?
Worked great in an air conditioned testing facility, provided a flexible armor lighter than equivalent steel plates-
Until it was stored improperly (anything besides an igloo cooler) and the packs leaked, and loss effectiveness in hot weather, and got stiff in extreme cold, losing effectiveness and flexibility at once.
It’s the year 2400. All clothing is impervious to bullets and consists of overlapping fell packets with cloth lining in fashionable cuts. Shooting someone isn’t really considered a crime anymore as long as the person isn’t naked or not wearing a hat.
Daggers and swords are the only realistic means of self defense and murder since they can puncture gel cloth and compromise its protection.
If it can withstand bullet impact at sub 100 yards of a spicy round like 7.62 NATO, .50 BMG, etc. without adding the weight and thickness of level IV composite plates, then it would have a huge market with the US Military.
Then again, idk how much you need to withstand that kind of impact in a dramatically better way than hard composite level IV plates.
They fired microscopic basalt particles at it and some slightly larger bits of aluminum. I tend to worry about a lot of things, but my mind was, and still is, completely free of concern about being shot at by boffins from Kent wielding miniaturized sand guns.
This is cool, but the article seems about 30 years too soon.
That's just delusional thinking.
If cell manufacturers don't use a great protective material they will lose out on money because somebody will make an external casing using the same material.
It won't work most likely because it isn't at as great as the marketing release promises. Which is almost always the case.
This won't be a problem. Case makers will use the best tech they can. The issue is taking a new novel thing like this to market. Will it biodegrade? Is it cheap? Is it actually better than existing tech at preventing drop shattering across ten drops?
We used to use 10,000 lbs of pig pancreas to make 1 lb of insulin.
[https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theatlantic.com%2Fhealth%2Farchive%2F2017%2F05%2Fsmithfield-pork-organ-transplants%2F524304%2F&psig=AOvVaw3hWTGSQ-ZtxlFfPc2CCtJT&ust=1672593941886000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA4QjRxqFwoTCJDEwo-wpPwCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE](https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theatlantic.com%2Fhealth%2Farchive%2F2017%2F05%2Fsmithfield-pork-organ-transplants%2F524304%2F&psig=AOvVaw3hWTGSQ-ZtxlFfPc2CCtJT&ust=1672593941886000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA4QjRxqFwoTCJDEwo-wpPwCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE)
How many pounds of humans will we need to make a suit of body-armor and space gear for one person?
None, the gel protein components (talin) are produced recombinantly using E.Coli bacteria! All parts of this gel is animal free. Usually we produce proteins like talin for disease research. See here from Ben Goult’s recent paper on talin mutations, the gel components were produced in the same way. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35861643/
I was curious to know if it could be applied to vehicles, as severe injuries or deaths are still a significant number. But then it occurred to me, even if they kept costs low enough to integrate it into vehicle production, it probably would be expensive to replace after an accident. Not just the impact area itself, but the adjacent parts of the impact would probably have to be reapplied or such, depending on what the warranty would allow coverage after impact...(sounds like a headache for underwriters)
On second thought...I don't think car manufacturers would integrate it into their production line anytime soon, until decades of reliable implementation of some other similar type. (think military vehicle like a Humvee)
Years into the future aliens will find us and say “well they had the technology they just kept investing it into their cellphones” lol
Meanwhile, the aliens already figured it out so they have the large padded heads as part of their DNA.
LOL!
I mean, realistically most people don’t use body armor or space gear, but we all have a phone. Using this technology for something practical for everyday use doesn’t detract from its usefulness in other, more glamorous situations.
Try this gel in football helmets. Too many people getting brain damage.
Football helmets work just fine. The issue is the brain hitting the inside of the skull. They would be better off without helmets because they wouldn’t hit so hard. Rugby doesn’t have nearly the kind of brain damage issues they have in football. More cuts, bruises, broken noses, etc. I’d take that over a concussion. Don’t really want either, but at least you won’t develop neurological problems from a crooked nose.
Rugby do have a problem with concussions.
Suddenly, science fiction with aliens whose entire infrastructure is made from organic chitin - from armor, to weapons, to buildings, and even space ships - doesn't seem so exotic.
Man, I just started writing a story with such aliens and thought I was being a tad original
Hey but this is great news: your fiction is rooted in hard (speculative) science now!
That’s the positivity I need for the new year. Thank you!
Props to Octavia Butler - as is tradition
Laughs in yuzzahn vong
I liked that tech a _lot._
Scorn
I wonder if it could be used to improve football helmet safety?
Football helmets, even with the above technology, can only protect against skull fractures. They are unable to protect against concussions. There simply isn't enough room to decelerate slowly enough to stop the brain from impacting the inside of the skull.
What if we filled helmets like these full fancy impact gel? https://imgur.com/t/schwartz/Of5Ir
We could, but we're *surrounded by assholes*
Yo!!!
https://i.imgur.com/JTTsa9O.jpg
The issue is not the helmet but the space between your skull and your brain which is getting banged up against it all the same.
So you’re saying we need to fill football players ~~skills~~ skulls with jelly?
No, that would be stupid, we should use some sort of ballistic foam instead.
Just install some shocks in the skull. It's not that hard, my bike has like 2
Or maybe teeny tiny airbags that go off in your skull when your Apple Watch senses a fall.
*And so began the widespread practice of partial lobotimisation to make the space to add the cushioning.*
No, the concussion does that job already
Well, that’s effectively what repeated TBI is doing anyway…
But not the same. The less force your skull experiences, the less force your brain experiences against the skull.
You brain is rapidly accelerating or decelerating no matter what happens outside the skull.
Why? What's making it decelerate? Apparently something *inside* the skull and not the collision with the other person, because that's all happening outside.
r/Angryupvote
So… a solution would be for footballers to have larger helmets? I would totally watch a match with all the players looking like Toads from Super Mario!
Larger helmets means more mass and leverage on already fragile necks. You'd need something like a [HANS device](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HANS_device) too, but now you're adding mass and leverage to fragile lower backs and knees. Human beings aren't built for impact sports. We really should just come back to football once we've got remote pilotable athletic robots.
Just stop playing dangerous sports like football and boxing
Get rid of helmets. All padding actually. It allows for much harder hits. No padding would be safer because they would not plow into each other as hard.
History shows players plowed into each other dangerously, even fatally, hard without pads. Which is why they have pads now.
But since the gel could absorb some of the impact, the force on the brain/head (apart from any whiplash effects) would still lessen the impact right?
Unless the NFL decides to start rotating helmets after every play, no. Helmets that are designed to stop concussions don’t really exist because if you’re in a situation where you need a helmet, you probably want it to save your life above anything else. We already know how to make concussion mitigating head protection, it’s just bubble wrap.
Then why don’t we have bubble wrap helmets? 😆
I reckon if American football was played without helmets it would be better. We’d see players be more conscious of where they put their heads in the tackle and less likely to dive head first into players.
I'm not sure. In rugby, where there are no helmets, since the acceleration of the game and the muscle gain of the players, we have the same problems.
Yes but we still have smarter tackle technique than a lot of NFL players. You can even see in the “no pad” leagues in America it’s still “safer” than with pads
Nowhere, in any of the linked sources (which included the preprint paper), is anything said about the thickness of the material used in the test. The results are pretty spectacular, but if it adds an inch or two to body armor it’d be nearly useless in that application. Same goes for something as simple as a smartphone case. This will, ***absolutely***, have legitimate use applications but the article seems to be sensationalizing what reality might come of this discovery a bit.
Yes hydrogels are great and can be very tough but as they are mainly water they are heavy, and useless for most protective applications. They also dry out if not hermetically sealed. In the present research the proteins have long term stability issues, and the hydrogel would be useless in space (one of the suggested applications) as it would freeze. Interesting article but not obviously commercial
Heavier than plate armor though?
Not to mention that anything made of gel is sensitive chemically and thermally. Remember the dragonscale gel pack armor? Worked great in an air conditioned testing facility, provided a flexible armor lighter than equivalent steel plates- Until it was stored improperly (anything besides an igloo cooler) and the packs leaked, and loss effectiveness in hot weather, and got stiff in extreme cold, losing effectiveness and flexibility at once.
Bring outchya dead! Don’t want to bury grandma? Donate her body to help build supersonic impact-resistant space gear and cellphone cases!
Just don’t use stem cells! Those come from aborted babies you know. /s
can withstand supersonic impacts. 100s of uses like knee guards will come. protecting cell phones gets the material into mass manufacturing now.
It’s the year 2400. All clothing is impervious to bullets and consists of overlapping fell packets with cloth lining in fashionable cuts. Shooting someone isn’t really considered a crime anymore as long as the person isn’t naked or not wearing a hat. Daggers and swords are the only realistic means of self defense and murder since they can puncture gel cloth and compromise its protection.
I feel like "cell phone cases" should be listed first and that the "and even" should be body armor.
I think they need to add emphasis to the pun of using cells in *cell* phone cases.
I thought the same thing, but with the space gear at the end. Like, phone cases is the most pedestrian of the three listed lol
If it can withstand bullet impact at sub 100 yards of a spicy round like 7.62 NATO, .50 BMG, etc. without adding the weight and thickness of level IV composite plates, then it would have a huge market with the US Military. Then again, idk how much you need to withstand that kind of impact in a dramatically better way than hard composite level IV plates.
Can’t wait til they make shoes with this
Then you can finally not worry about shooting yourself in the foot!
At least when the machines take over, they'll have a reason to keep us around.
How about making arthritic joints more shock resistant
Cellphone cases are made of people! PEOPLE!
Soylent jeans are made of people!
Coat this on battle tanks/fight jets/war ships since world war 3 is alr on the horizon.
“Why are we paying for a space program when all that tech research could go to improving life right here on planet Earth?” Oh… it does… nm….
Great now they will just harvest us
Soylent Green is people!
DID HE SAY CELL PHONE CASES??
They fired microscopic basalt particles at it and some slightly larger bits of aluminum. I tend to worry about a lot of things, but my mind was, and still is, completely free of concern about being shot at by boffins from Kent wielding miniaturized sand guns. This is cool, but the article seems about 30 years too soon.
all ground breaking scientific articles are 30 years ahead…. did you expect the Wright brothers to go super sonic or something??
It can’t and it won’t.
Wow, such a compelling arguement you got there. Just absolutely rock solid reasoning, facts and logic.
To be fair, this is almost always the truth for tech like this.
[удалено]
That's just delusional thinking. If cell manufacturers don't use a great protective material they will lose out on money because somebody will make an external casing using the same material. It won't work most likely because it isn't at as great as the marketing release promises. Which is almost always the case.
This won't be a problem. Case makers will use the best tech they can. The issue is taking a new novel thing like this to market. Will it biodegrade? Is it cheap? Is it actually better than existing tech at preventing drop shattering across ten drops?
We used to use 10,000 lbs of pig pancreas to make 1 lb of insulin. [https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theatlantic.com%2Fhealth%2Farchive%2F2017%2F05%2Fsmithfield-pork-organ-transplants%2F524304%2F&psig=AOvVaw3hWTGSQ-ZtxlFfPc2CCtJT&ust=1672593941886000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA4QjRxqFwoTCJDEwo-wpPwCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE](https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theatlantic.com%2Fhealth%2Farchive%2F2017%2F05%2Fsmithfield-pork-organ-transplants%2F524304%2F&psig=AOvVaw3hWTGSQ-ZtxlFfPc2CCtJT&ust=1672593941886000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA4QjRxqFwoTCJDEwo-wpPwCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAE) How many pounds of humans will we need to make a suit of body-armor and space gear for one person?
3
Wow that’s a low price!
None, the gel protein components (talin) are produced recombinantly using E.Coli bacteria! All parts of this gel is animal free. Usually we produce proteins like talin for disease research. See here from Ben Goult’s recent paper on talin mutations, the gel components were produced in the same way. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35861643/
Those wacky E.Coli. Sometimes they give you shock-absorbing gel, sometimes it's hemorrhagic diarrhea.
I was curious to know if it could be applied to vehicles, as severe injuries or deaths are still a significant number. But then it occurred to me, even if they kept costs low enough to integrate it into vehicle production, it probably would be expensive to replace after an accident. Not just the impact area itself, but the adjacent parts of the impact would probably have to be reapplied or such, depending on what the warranty would allow coverage after impact...(sounds like a headache for underwriters) On second thought...I don't think car manufacturers would integrate it into their production line anytime soon, until decades of reliable implementation of some other similar type. (think military vehicle like a Humvee)
From talin to talinvincible. It brands itself.
I’m glad cell phone cases are right up there with body armor and space gear priorities.
Is the new gel biodegradable or last forever in the environment?
We’re gonna make our skin stronger with more skin
Bet you my phone won’t survive one day
What about my knees!!
So that’s where all my synovial fluid has been going…
Hmm resources and links please!…thanks
MEATPHONE
So…am I resistant to supersonic impacts? You know, more than just the brief nanosecond I may already be…
Soylent Green is body armor?
But can it tell why kids love cinnamon toast crunch?
Time to harvest the humans I guess
We are solent green
AND …… even cell phone cases
Yet we cant cure cancer in children!! 🤔
keeping them from getting shot is something right???
Is talin only found in human cells? I find that kind of manipulative - kind of sensationalist - if it's not specific to human cells.
Going to be a game changer for trail runner footwear
Woah
reminds me of the gel in spartan suits in halo
Flubber??
Let the human cell harvest begin
Protein in human cells. The evolution of body armor: Cloth, leather, metal, ceramic, kevlar, and bodies.
There is no pictures of said product. You're welcome.
Where can I donate?
Is it vegan though?
Let’s put it in my knees
But can they inject it into joints to replace lost cartilage? If it’s made from a human protein, could it be engineered to resist rejection?
40k drop pods soon?
But why do we flop when we fall