* . *
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact
Tuesday, August 5, 2025
Earth-News
  • Home
  • Business
  • Entertainment
    ‘Billie Jean’ – Hyde Park Herald

    The Enduring Magic Behind ‘Billie Jean’ Revealed

    Hank Hill returns to a changed world in new ‘King of the Hill’ episodes – New Haven Register

    Hank Hill Navigates a Bold New World in Thrilling New ‘King of the Hill’ Episodes

    Exclusive | Fox Takes Stake in IndyCar Owner Penske Entertainment – The Wall Street Journal

    Exclusive | Fox Takes Stake in IndyCar Owner Penske Entertainment – The Wall Street Journal

    Go-to entertainment: why gaming was made for the toilet – The Guardian

    Why Gaming Is the Ultimate Way to Pass Time in the Bathroom

    Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra takes the Lollapalooza stage – Yahoo Home

    Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra takes the Lollapalooza stage – Yahoo Home

    Sens. Blackburn, Warnock introduce CREATE Act to provide tax relief to music creators – Yahoo Home

    Sens. Blackburn and Warnock Launch CREATE Act to Deliver Tax Relief for Music Creators

  • General
  • Health
  • News

    Cracking the Code: Why China’s Economic Challenges Aren’t Shaking Markets, Unlike America’s” – Bloomberg

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Trending Tags

    • Trump Inauguration
    • United Stated
    • White House
    • Market Stories
    • Election Results
  • Science
  • Sports
  • Technology
    Nasdaq-listed Verb Technology to build $558 million TON treasury, rebrand as TON Strategy Co. – The Block

    Nasdaq-Listed Verb Technology to Build $558 Million TON Treasury and Rebrand as TON Strategy Co

    How Tech Firms Like Google and Meta Are Embracing the Military – The New York Times

    How Tech Firms Like Google and Meta Are Embracing the Military – The New York Times

    Credo Technology: Wiring The AI Revolution (NASDAQ:CRDO) – Seeking Alpha

    Credo Technology: Driving the Next Wave of AI Innovation

    Microsoft Seeks to Extend Access to OpenAI Technology – PYMNTS.com

    Microsoft Aims to Broaden Access to OpenAI Technology

    Livonia police use grappler technology to stop drunk driver – ClickOnDetroit | WDIV Local 4

    Livonia Police Deploy Grappler Technology to Safely Stop Drunk Driver

    Emory orthopaedic surgeons use robotic technology to transform knee replacement surgery – Emory News Center

    How Robotic Technology is Revolutionizing Knee Replacement Surgery

    Trending Tags

    • Nintendo Switch
    • CES 2017
    • Playstation 4 Pro
    • Mark Zuckerberg
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Business
  • Entertainment
    ‘Billie Jean’ – Hyde Park Herald

    The Enduring Magic Behind ‘Billie Jean’ Revealed

    Hank Hill returns to a changed world in new ‘King of the Hill’ episodes – New Haven Register

    Hank Hill Navigates a Bold New World in Thrilling New ‘King of the Hill’ Episodes

    Exclusive | Fox Takes Stake in IndyCar Owner Penske Entertainment – The Wall Street Journal

    Exclusive | Fox Takes Stake in IndyCar Owner Penske Entertainment – The Wall Street Journal

    Go-to entertainment: why gaming was made for the toilet – The Guardian

    Why Gaming Is the Ultimate Way to Pass Time in the Bathroom

    Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra takes the Lollapalooza stage – Yahoo Home

    Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestra takes the Lollapalooza stage – Yahoo Home

    Sens. Blackburn, Warnock introduce CREATE Act to provide tax relief to music creators – Yahoo Home

    Sens. Blackburn and Warnock Launch CREATE Act to Deliver Tax Relief for Music Creators

  • General
  • Health
  • News

    Cracking the Code: Why China’s Economic Challenges Aren’t Shaking Markets, Unlike America’s” – Bloomberg

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Trump’s Narrow Window to Spread the Truth About Harris

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    Israel-Gaza war live updates: Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran, group says

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    PAP Boss to Niger Delta Youths, Stay Away from the Protest

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Court Restricts Protests In Lagos To Freedom, Peace Park

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Fans React to Jazz Jennings’ Inspiring Weight Loss Journey

    Trending Tags

    • Trump Inauguration
    • United Stated
    • White House
    • Market Stories
    • Election Results
  • Science
  • Sports
  • Technology
    Nasdaq-listed Verb Technology to build $558 million TON treasury, rebrand as TON Strategy Co. – The Block

    Nasdaq-Listed Verb Technology to Build $558 Million TON Treasury and Rebrand as TON Strategy Co

    How Tech Firms Like Google and Meta Are Embracing the Military – The New York Times

    How Tech Firms Like Google and Meta Are Embracing the Military – The New York Times

    Credo Technology: Wiring The AI Revolution (NASDAQ:CRDO) – Seeking Alpha

    Credo Technology: Driving the Next Wave of AI Innovation

    Microsoft Seeks to Extend Access to OpenAI Technology – PYMNTS.com

    Microsoft Aims to Broaden Access to OpenAI Technology

    Livonia police use grappler technology to stop drunk driver – ClickOnDetroit | WDIV Local 4

    Livonia Police Deploy Grappler Technology to Safely Stop Drunk Driver

    Emory orthopaedic surgeons use robotic technology to transform knee replacement surgery – Emory News Center

    How Robotic Technology is Revolutionizing Knee Replacement Surgery

    Trending Tags

    • Nintendo Switch
    • CES 2017
    • Playstation 4 Pro
    • Mark Zuckerberg
No Result
View All Result
Earth-News
No Result
View All Result
Home Science

Innovative Liquid Cushioning Technology Promises Revolution in Safety Gear

July 27, 2023
in Science
Innovative Liquid Cushioning Technology Promises Revolution in Safety Gear
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

By University of Virginia School of Engineering and Applied Science
July 26, 2023

Liquid Helmet Protection Concept Art

An advanced nanofoam material promises improved protection and comfort for sports gear, with potential applications in car safety systems and wearable medical devices. The innovative material overcomes the limitations of traditional nanofoam, providing a flexible and comfortable solution that can withstand multiple impacts. (Artist’s concept dramatizing the “liquid” safety cushion.)

New breakthrough in material design will help football players, car occupants, and hospital patients.

A significant breakthrough in the field of protective gear has been made with the discovery that football players were unknowingly acquiring permanent brain damage from repeated head impacts throughout their professional careers. This realization triggered an urgent search for better head protection solutions. Among these innovations is nanofoam, a material found inside football helmets.

Thanks to mechanical and aerospace engineering associate professor Baoxing Xu at the University of Virginia and his research team, nanofoam just received a big upgrade and protective sports equipment could, too. This newly invented design integrates nanofoam with “non-wetting ionized liquid,” a form of water that Xu and his research team now know blends perfectly with nanofoam to create a liquid cushion. This versatile and responsive material will give better protection to athletes and is promising for use in protecting car occupants and aiding hospital patients using wearable medical devices.

The team’s research was recently published in the journal Advanced Materials.

Liquid Cushion Technology

A diagram illustrating how a liquid nanofoam cushion responds to an impact. Credit: Contributed by B. Xu

Upgraded Nanofoam: Advancements and Potential

For optimal safety, the protective foam sandwiched between the inner and outer layers of a helmet should not only be able to take one hit but multiple hits, game after game. The material needs to be cushiony enough to create a soft place for a head to land, but resilient enough to bounce back and be ready for the next blow. And the material needs to be resilient but not hard, because “hard” hurts heads, too. Having one material do all of these things is a pretty tall order.

The team advanced their work previously published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, which started exploring the use of liquids in nanofoam, to create a material that meets the complex safety demands of high-contact sports.

“We found out that creating a liquid nanofoam cushion with ionized water instead of regular water made a significant difference in the way the material performed,” Xu said. “Using ionized water in the design is a breakthrough because we uncovered an unusual liquid-ion coordination network which made it possible to create a more sophisticated material.”

Baoxing Xu

Associate Professor Baoxing Xu in the UVA Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. Credit: Tom Cogill

Enhanced Performance and Comfort

The liquid nanofoam cushion allows the inside of the helmet to compress and disperse the impact force, minimizing the force transmitted to the head and reducing the risk of injury. It also regains its original shape after impact, allowing for multiple hits and ensuring the helmet’s continued effectiveness in protecting the athlete’s head during the game.

“An added bonus,” Xu continued, “is that the enhanced material is more flexible and much more comfortable to wear. The material dynamically responds to external jolts because of the way the ion clusters and networks are fabricated in the material.”

“The liquid cushion can be designed as lighter, smaller, and safer protective devices,” said associate professor Weiyi Lu, a collaborator from civil engineering at Michigan State University. “Also, the reduced weight and size of the liquid nanofoam liners will revolutionize the design of the hard shell of future helmets. You could be watching a football game one day and wonder how the smaller helmets protect the players’ heads. It could be because of our new material.”

Overcoming Traditional Nanofoam Limitations

In traditional nanofoam, the protection mechanism relies on material properties that react when it gets crunched, or mechanically deformed, such as “collapse” and “densification.” Collapse is what it sounds like, and densification is the severe deformation of foam on strong impact. After the collapse and densification, the traditional nanofoam doesn’t recover very well because of the permanent deformation of materials —making the protection a one-time deal. When compared to the liquid nanofoam, these properties are very slow (a few milliseconds) and cannot accommodate the “high-force reduction requirement,” which means it can’t effectively absorb and dissipate high-force blows in the short time window associated with collisions and impacts.

Another downside of traditional nanofoam is that, when subjected to multiple small impacts that don’t deform the material, the foam becomes completely “hard” and behaves as a rigid body that cannot provide protection. The rigidness could potentially lead to injuries and damage to soft tissues, such as traumatic brain injury (TBI).

By manipulating the mechanical properties of materials — integrating nanoporous materials with “non-wetting liquid” or ionized water — the team developed a way to make a material that could respond to impacts in a few microseconds because this combination allows for superfast liquid transport in a nanoconfined environment. Also, upon unloading, i.e., after impacts, due to its non-wetting nature, the liquid nanofoam cushion can return to its original form because the liquid is ejected out of the pores, thereby withstanding repeated blows. This dynamic conforming and reforming ability also remedies the problem of the material becoming rigid from micro-impacts.

Extended Applications of Liquid Nanofoam

The same liquid properties that make this new nanofoam safer for athletic gear also offer a potential use in other places where collisions happen, like cars, whose safety and material protective systems are being reconsidered to embrace the emerging era of electric propulsion and automated vehicles. It can be used to create protective cushions that absorb impacts during accidents or help reduce vibrations and noise.

Another purpose that might not be as evident is the role liquid nanofoam can play in the hospital setting. The foam can be used in wearable medical devices like a smartwatch, which monitors your heart rate and other vital signs. By incorporating liquid nanofoam technology, the watch can have a soft and flexible foam-like material on its underside and help improve the accuracy of the sensors by ensuring proper contact with your skin. It can conform to the shape of your wrist, making it comfortable to wear all day. Additionally, the foam can provide extra protection by acting as a shock absorber. If you accidentally bump your wrist against a hard surface, the foam can help cushion the impact and prevent any harm to the sensors or your skin.

Reference: “Nanoconfined Water-Ion Coordination Network for Flexible Energy Dissipation Device” by Yuan Gao, Mingzhe Li, Chi Zhan, Haozhe Zhang, Mengtian Yin, Weiyi Lu and Baoxing Xu, 6 July 2023, Advanced Materials.
DOI: 10.1002/adma.202303759

>>> Read full article>>>
Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source : SciTechDaily – https://scitechdaily.com/innovative-liquid-cushioning-technology-promises-revolution-in-safety-gear/

Tags: innovativeliquidscience
Previous Post

Does Nothingness Exist?

Next Post

Bitter Harvest: The Dirty Little Secret of Strawberry Fields

Your nature photo might be a scientific breakthrough in disguise – ScienceDaily

Could Your Nature Photo Unlock the Next Big Scientific Breakthrough?

August 5, 2025
Scientists reexamine 47-year-old fossil and discover a new Jurassic sea monster – ScienceDaily

47-Year-Old Fossil Reveals an Astonishing New Jurassic Sea Monster

August 5, 2025
Moment of Science: Parker probe offers insights into sun, solar wind – WIS News 10

Parker Probe Unveils New Secrets About the Sun and Solar Wind

August 5, 2025
Nurse, marathon runner Jin Lee promotes healthy lifestyle by example – Bucks County Herald newspaper

Nurse, marathon runner Jin Lee promotes healthy lifestyle by example – Bucks County Herald newspaper

August 5, 2025
Who’s the top dog? Wave-riding canines compete in the World Dog Surfing Championships – NPR

Meet the Ultimate Wave-Riding Dogs Competing for the World Surfing Championship!

August 5, 2025
‘The Big Short’ investor warns despite economy’s stronghold against ‘thoughtless,’ ‘unprecedented’ tariffs so far, stagflation is coming – Fortune

The Big Short’ Investor Issues Stark Warning: Stagflation Threatens Despite Economy’s Surprising Strength Against Unprecedented Tariffs

August 5, 2025
‘Billie Jean’ – Hyde Park Herald

The Enduring Magic Behind ‘Billie Jean’ Revealed

August 5, 2025
Health insurance in Pennsylvania may see biggest hike in years – 90.5 WESA

Pennsylvania Braces for Its Largest Health Insurance Increase in Years

August 5, 2025
The Origins of the Political Power Grab in Texas – The New York Times

Inside Texas’s Bold Quest for Political Control

August 5, 2025
Nasdaq-listed Verb Technology to build $558 million TON treasury, rebrand as TON Strategy Co. – The Block

Nasdaq-Listed Verb Technology to Build $558 Million TON Treasury and Rebrand as TON Strategy Co

August 5, 2025

Categories

Archives

August 2025
MTWTFSS
 123
45678910
11121314151617
18192021222324
25262728293031
« Jul    
Earth-News.info

The Earth News is an independent English-language daily published Website from all around the World News

Browse by Category

  • Business (20,132)
  • Ecology (755)
  • Economy (780)
  • Entertainment (21,657)
  • General (16,295)
  • Health (9,817)
  • Lifestyle (788)
  • News (22,149)
  • People (779)
  • Politics (789)
  • Science (15,993)
  • Sports (21,275)
  • Technology (15,757)
  • World (761)

Recent News

Your nature photo might be a scientific breakthrough in disguise – ScienceDaily

Could Your Nature Photo Unlock the Next Big Scientific Breakthrough?

August 5, 2025
Scientists reexamine 47-year-old fossil and discover a new Jurassic sea monster – ScienceDaily

47-Year-Old Fossil Reveals an Astonishing New Jurassic Sea Monster

August 5, 2025
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Privacy & Policy
  • Contact

© 2023 earth-news.info

No Result
View All Result

© 2023 earth-news.info

No Result
View All Result

© 2023 earth-news.info

Go to mobile version