Scanning electron microscope image of limpet teeth.
University of Portsmouth
14 comments:
Gemma
said...
Limpet teeth are the new strongest material? Well thats great and all, but if you think about it, all these animals are so much better than us yet we are the main species. If you think about it, there are animals with amazing "superpowers" that is us humans had we would be famous. Evolution decided to give these little sea snails these amazingly strong teeth because they needed them to survive. Personally, I think that is really amazing. We keep discovering things we didn't even know existed. Many things we think are impossible could just as well be possible but we just don't know how to do them. Anyway, back to Limpets. I have a serious question about them. Why would scientists name a creature with amazingly sharp teeth a limpet? I mean, they could have named it, Super Mega powered teeth thing. In all seriousness, though, these little creatures could be the next step in biomimicry. Sometime in the future we will find a way to make materials similar to Limpet teeth, and then we will have a way stronger material! If we keep breaking records i nature like his, it will make us so much more powerful when we use biomimicry with it! If our earth is home to amazing creatures like this we shouldn't ruin it! (Wait, when did this turn into an essay about being green?)
I think that this was pretty cool especially because I had never heard of Limpet teeth. It was extremely weird to think that they are the strongest thing and they are 100 times thinner than that of a HUMAN HAIR!!!!!!! This is a really weird article. The picture on the article reminded me of shark teeth!!! Like Gemma said, if humans had those kinds of teeth, then we would be in the Guinness Book of World Records, we would be on a number of TV shows, and we would get so much money we could buy the Taj Mahal! The teeth could be used in biomimicry too, because they are so strong!!!! If scientists could mimic the material, that could also be the next step in architecture. There could be buildings for the poor built on much stronger foundation. The fact that these little tiny creatures have that small of teeth and they are so extremely STRONG, it is truly amazing. Maybe, they could also be used for other purposes.
It is really cool how Limpet teeth contradict the rule where smaller objects are stronger while larger objects are weaker. Spider webs have very high density, making them very strong for their weight. It makes sense why Limpet teeth have to be so strong in order to grip onto rocks, while withstanding the sea currents.
I think that this is just yet more proof of Nature's continued ingenuity! It is amazing that spider silk, long believed to be THE strongest, THE lightest, is now proven wrong by something that is basically a sea snail (some don't even believe snails have teeth) and kind of gross. (they're wrong though) Nature will never run out of surprises.
I think that it is amazing that scientists have found a materiel that is stronger than spider silk. Although, they don't know why they are so strong, they will hopefully try to find out why Limpet teeth are so strong. If they figure this out, maybe this can be applied to making other materiel stronger. The potential application of Limpet teeth reminds me of our BioMimicry Unit that we studied earlier this year.
I think that this data is very interesting. If we can find a way to mimick this material we could make large models and structures that can last longer and withstand bombings. Just think of it for a second, a building that could not fall after it being, lets say, in a major catastrophe. Such a thing would be amazing for build structures. But as they stated it would be hard to mass produce because it is such a small amount coming from the animal that it would be very impractical to use without mimicking it. But i am so amazed that scienintists these days are able to look at a material and look at how it is made and create a similar material for every day use. Overall I think this is a very interesting topic.
I could not believe that limpet teeth hold the new world record for strongest natural material! I think that this new finding opens up a vast variety of new and exciting innovation. For example, we can build more protective structures that don't shake for earthquakes with a material that include limpet teeth. I also found it extraordinaire that limpet teeth are 100 times thinner than a human hair!! This also can be used to the advantage of an engineer because with this thin material, you can create flexible structures that won't rip, or take a hassle to build. Some of the only downsides to this new strong material is that it comes from a limpet. A limpet is a sea creature. This means that it will be more difficult to actually receive this material, as it is at the bottom of the ocean. Another downside to this material, is it is hard to mass produce, because there is such a small amount of it, and it comes from a small animal. I think that if we can save this material, and let the limpets reproduce rapidly, we can really take advantage of this material, and mass produce it.If this new material can be utilized though, I believe that we as mankind can become more advanced engineers, as well as we can create new and innovative designs. As well, I did some research: http://sciencelearn.org.nz/Science-Stories/Where-Land-Meets-Sea/Adapting-to-marine-habitats and found out that limpets can survive on rocky shores for a small amount of time. This means that we can breed them in farms as long as we place water on them frequently. Overall, this article was extremely intriguing and very interesting.
It was already amazing that spider silk was the strongest biological material in the world already, but now the new toughest material is from one the smallest sea creatures? It is really cool that they are thinking of doing the same mimicking process for this material as they were doing for carbon fiber using it in formula one racing. It is the same effect that happens with spider strands. By itself it is incredbly easy to tear apart but when it is put together in large amounts it cannot be destroyed unless you use hardware tools/supplies. These materials from Limpet teeth also do not get weaker as they are put together in larger amounts making large scale projects and models with this material can be a lot stronger than made out of spider webs. This material could also be used in fillings for dental purposes, because of its ability to not just fall out after a long time. Though this material is incredibly hard to mass produce due to its small amounts because it comes from snails which is a really small animal with teeth we can barely see. It would be really scary if we cannot reproduce it that well because these animals would most likely become extinct within a year due to its demand of such a rare and special material. We learned that this material is 5x stronger than spider silk making it almost impossible to tear apart in half. As they mentioned size doesn't matter when the material is almost impenetrable
Wow little ocean dwelling snails have the strongest material in the world? At first that sounded absolutely ridiculous to me. Wow this material could be used for so many things and people would not even have to kill the snails. I think that it is so amazing how different animals can be better that us humans in building and crafting materials. One of my questions is how long will it take to build a copy of this material. I thought it was amain how the Limpet material is 100 times smaller than a human hair. That it insane. I thought that this subject was very interesting and I would love to learn more about it.
I like how the little one turns out to be the strongest one. Right now, I think Limpet teeth have just proved science wrong, because they tested the teeth, and its results showed against science. According to science, the bigger the material, the more flaws it has, and the more flaws it has, the weaker it is. And the smaller it is, the less flaws it is/the stronger it is. But, what the researchers/tester found was this: when they were testing, they realized that the limpet tooth material ranged from 3 to 6.5 gigapascals (GPa), and that was for all sizes of the limpet teeth. So, size doesn't matter for this material! I found that interesting, and now I know sometimes science can be changed.
I think that this is an amazing new material, that can change the world. It is common at the bottom of the sea but very small, making it hard to get. I think this is a material that will help us develop a lot, and like Gemma said, it is amazing that nature gave it to these snails. I think it is smart to give it to them so they can be safe from the currents.
I agree with Siji. I find it really interesting how they counteract most laws of science. On his spider web comment, if you wove together enough spiderweb silk, you would have a material stronger than steel. I wonder how long they have had teeth this strong. What I mean by that is have they evolved with in the last 200 years, or have they always been that we and we just discovered them now?
I was surprised when I read this article. I didn't know that Limpet teeth are the strongest material. Furthermore, I didn't even know what Limpet teeth were, just like Grace said! I actually thought that spiderweb was the strongest material. Now that I know it is really Limpet teeth though...Wow. I also agree with Justin (G) when he said we could kind of mimic limpet teeth with real world objects to create stronger building structures, etc.
14 comments:
Limpet teeth are the new strongest material? Well thats great and all, but if you think about it, all these animals are so much better than us yet we are the main species. If you think about it, there are animals with amazing "superpowers" that is us humans had we would be famous. Evolution decided to give these little sea snails these amazingly strong teeth because they needed them to survive. Personally, I think that is really amazing. We keep discovering things we didn't even know existed. Many things we think are impossible could just as well be possible but we just don't know how to do them. Anyway, back to Limpets. I have a serious question about them. Why would scientists name a creature with amazingly sharp teeth a limpet? I mean, they could have named it, Super Mega powered teeth thing. In all seriousness, though, these little creatures could be the next step in biomimicry. Sometime in the future we will find a way to make materials similar to Limpet teeth, and then we will have a way stronger material! If we keep breaking records i nature like his, it will make us so much more powerful when we use biomimicry with it! If our earth is home to amazing creatures like this we shouldn't ruin it! (Wait, when did this turn into an essay about being green?)
I meant in instead of i and this instead of his, sorry.
I think that this was pretty cool especially because I had never heard of Limpet teeth. It was extremely weird to think that they are the strongest thing and they are 100 times thinner than that of a HUMAN HAIR!!!!!!! This is a really weird article. The picture on the article reminded me of shark teeth!!! Like Gemma said, if humans had those kinds of teeth, then we would be in the Guinness Book of World Records, we would be on a number of TV shows, and we would get so much money we could buy the Taj Mahal! The teeth could be used in biomimicry too, because they are so strong!!!! If scientists could mimic the material, that could also be the next step in architecture. There could be buildings for the poor built on much stronger foundation. The fact that these little tiny creatures have that small of teeth and they are so extremely STRONG, it is truly amazing. Maybe, they could also be used for other purposes.
It is really cool how Limpet teeth contradict the rule where smaller objects are stronger while larger objects are weaker. Spider webs have very high density, making them very strong for their weight. It makes sense why Limpet teeth have to be so strong in order to grip onto rocks, while withstanding the sea currents.
I think that this is just yet more proof of Nature's continued ingenuity! It is amazing that spider silk, long believed to be THE strongest, THE lightest, is now proven wrong by something that is basically a sea snail (some don't even believe snails have teeth) and kind of gross. (they're wrong though) Nature will never run out of surprises.
I think that it is amazing that scientists have found a materiel that is stronger than spider silk. Although, they don't know why they are so strong, they will hopefully try to find out why Limpet teeth are so strong. If they figure this out, maybe this can be applied to making other materiel stronger. The potential application of Limpet teeth reminds me of our BioMimicry Unit that we studied earlier this year.
I think that this data is very interesting. If we can find a way to mimick this material we could make large models and structures that can last longer and withstand bombings. Just think of it for a second, a building that could not fall after it being, lets say, in a major catastrophe. Such a thing would be amazing for build structures. But as they stated it would be hard to mass produce because it is such a small amount coming from the animal that it would be very impractical to use without mimicking it. But i am so amazed that scienintists these days are able to look at a material and look at how it is made and create a similar material for every day use. Overall I think this is a very interesting topic.
I could not believe that limpet teeth hold the new world record for strongest natural material! I think that this new finding opens up a vast variety of new and exciting innovation. For example, we can build more protective structures that don't shake for earthquakes with a material that include limpet teeth. I also found it extraordinaire that limpet teeth are 100 times thinner than a human hair!! This also can be used to the advantage of an engineer because with this thin material, you can create flexible structures that won't rip, or take a hassle to build. Some of the only downsides to this new strong material is that it comes from a limpet. A limpet is a sea creature. This means that it will be more difficult to actually receive this material, as it is at the bottom of the ocean. Another downside to this material, is it is hard to mass produce, because there is such a small amount of it, and it comes from a small animal. I think that if we can save this material, and let the limpets reproduce rapidly, we can really take advantage of this material, and mass produce it.If this new material can be utilized though, I believe that we as mankind can become more advanced engineers, as well as we can create new and innovative designs. As well, I did some research: http://sciencelearn.org.nz/Science-Stories/Where-Land-Meets-Sea/Adapting-to-marine-habitats and found out that limpets can survive on rocky shores for a small amount of time. This means that we can breed them in farms as long as we place water on them frequently. Overall, this article was extremely intriguing and very interesting.
It was already amazing that spider silk was the strongest biological material in the world already, but now the new toughest material is from one the smallest sea creatures? It is really cool that they are thinking of doing the same mimicking process for this material as they were doing for carbon fiber using it in formula one racing. It is the same effect that happens with spider strands. By itself it is incredbly easy to tear apart but when it is put together in large amounts it cannot be destroyed unless you use hardware tools/supplies. These materials from Limpet teeth also do not get weaker as they are put together in larger amounts making large scale projects and models with this material can be a lot stronger than made out of spider webs. This material could also be used in fillings for dental purposes, because of its ability to not just fall out after a long time. Though this material is incredibly hard to mass produce due to its small amounts because it comes from snails which is a really small animal with teeth we can barely see. It would be really scary if we cannot reproduce it that well because these animals would most likely become extinct within a year due to its demand of such a rare and special material. We learned that this material is 5x stronger than spider silk making it almost impossible to tear apart in half. As they mentioned size doesn't matter when the material is almost impenetrable
Wow little ocean dwelling snails have the strongest material in the world? At first that sounded absolutely ridiculous to me. Wow this material could be used for so many things and people would not even have to kill the snails. I think that it is so amazing how different animals can be better that us humans in building and crafting materials. One of my questions is how long will it take to build a copy of this material. I thought it was amain how the Limpet material is 100 times smaller than a human hair. That it insane. I thought that this subject was very interesting and I would love to learn more about it.
I like how the little one turns out to be the strongest one. Right now, I think Limpet teeth have just proved science wrong, because they tested the teeth, and its results showed against science. According to science, the bigger the material, the more flaws it has, and the more flaws it has, the weaker it is. And the smaller it is, the less flaws it is/the stronger it is. But, what the researchers/tester found was this: when they were testing, they realized that the limpet tooth material ranged from 3 to 6.5 gigapascals (GPa), and that was for all sizes of the limpet teeth. So, size doesn't matter for this material! I found that interesting, and now I know sometimes science can be changed.
I think that this is an amazing new material, that can change the world. It is common at the bottom of the sea but very small, making it hard to get. I think this is a material that will help us develop a lot, and like Gemma said, it is amazing that nature gave it to these snails. I think it is smart to give it to them so they can be safe from the currents.
I agree with Siji. I find it really interesting how they counteract most laws of science. On his spider web comment, if you wove together enough spiderweb silk, you would have a material stronger than steel. I wonder how long they have had teeth this strong. What I mean by that is have they evolved with in the last 200 years, or have they always been that we and we just discovered them now?
I was surprised when I read this article. I didn't know that Limpet teeth are the strongest material. Furthermore, I didn't even know what Limpet teeth were, just like Grace said! I actually thought that spiderweb was the strongest material. Now that I know it is really Limpet teeth though...Wow. I also agree with Justin (G) when he said we could kind of mimic limpet teeth with real world objects to create stronger building structures, etc.
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