Anyone who has seen Terminator 2 will never forget the T-1000, the evil robot played by Robert Patrick. It was an ingenuity made of liquid metal, the drops of which came back together to recompose the whole structure when someone destroyed it. Well, those drops are already a reality.
Researchers in China and the United States had previously obtained drops of liquid metal. But his experiments had always faced the same problem: the more or less rapid oxidation of that material, which ruined its properties. But, now, a team from the University of Shenzhen, China, has managed to solve this problem.
The traditional formula for making liquid metal droplets was to mix gallium, tin and another chemical element called Indian. But Chinese researchers have added a four component that is present in the kitchens of almost everyone, the Teflon, which has been responsible for solving the problem of oxidation.
The resulting liquid metal has, according to the authors of the study, an elasticity and robustness similar to that of a tennis ball. This material is expected to have valuable applications in the field of robotics and also to manufacture biomaterials sanitary.
