Self-healing metals

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Jun 9, 2015
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A very close relative of mine worked for a long time in Sandia National Laboratories . Now he is a professor at a university in the US. When we talk, I always bother him about something , he is patient and most often explains to me what I asked ..... :) He sent me this link via e-mail ..............

I will post link so you can read article ........... it is obvious that we are far from fully understanding or knowing about some things out there :) I know that Roman cement/concrete heals itself , but metal ?

 
Reminds me of the material supposedly recovered at Roswell in 1947. They said it was like aluminum foil, but when you crunched it up, it would spring right back to its original shape.

I often wonder what all is really out there that we aren't being told about, or at least the powers that be won't let out. "Disruptive technologies". Like the car that runs on water, or free energy from the Earth that Tesla was working on. But when JP Morgan heard about that, he was quoted as saying, "I can't put a meter on that". In other words, "I can't charge people money for free energy".

Interesting topic for Shop Talk! I like it! We aren't in Kansas anymore!
 
SF novels have been exploiting the idea of healing metal on spacecraft for years. In a vacuum environment like interstellar space, “cold fusion of metals“ is real. I think this is just the tip of the iceberg of understanding elements at a nano level.
 
Very cool, but not mysterious as far as I see it.
Larrin or others correct me if I am wrong, but this does not seem like a "Mirical" to me.
It sounds somewhat like the grain boundaries auto-repairing in many metals by recrystallization. IIRC, lead and some other softer metals can repair grain boundary fractures at room temp. That is why they can't be work hardened. I believe the recrystallization of platinum starts at around 600°F.

At 40nm resolution, we are seeing a very small area. IIRC, the grains in platinum are 100-200nm. So, we are looking at a micro-tear on a tiny part of a grain boundary.

To explain it in very simplified terms:
When stress is added the metal has shearing and other damage along the junctions of grains. This causes them to separate or crack apart. If the metal is heated enough recrystallization occurs. On some metals it does not need to be heated at all, or very little to start the recrystallization. The grain boundaries grow back together as before. The SEM vibrations may have added enough energy to start the recrystallization.
 
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