Tough as [Steel] Nails: Scientists Create Ultra-Rugged Metal-Glass

Imagine glass that’s as strong and durable as steel. That’s what a group of scientists from Berkeley Lab and the California Institute of Technology have recently created. Sure to supplant Gorilla Glass as manufacturers’ go-to for glass displays and pieces–assuming it gets out of the lab and onto the market–the new glass is a metal-mixed glass that is flexible and bends instead of cracking. According to Gizmag, this means that it has “a fracture toughness that goes beyond the limits of some of the strongest and toughest materials known.”

Imagine dropping or stepping on your phone and having the glass bend and bounce back rather than crack or shatter. The glass would also be well-suited for other applications–say vehicle windshields that don’t splinter or crack from stray rocks or home windows that are able to stand up to hurricane-like winds. Hopefully, we’ll see this glass on the market sometime in the not-so-distant future. [Gizmag via Dvice]