Aerogel (often called solid smoke) is one of the world’s weirdest materials. In the picture blelow a piece of aerogel with a mass of just over two grams is holding up a brick with a mass more than a thousand times larger.
Despite being only one and a half times as dense as air it’s also one of the strongest materials in the world as well as being one of the most resistant to heat.
It’s even been used in the depths of space by the Stardust probe to collect cosmic dust and comet fragments:
Do you have some in the science labs?
It looks fun to play with. 500g of aerogel can apparently lift half a ton. I’d like to try it.
Unfortunately aerogel has the downside of being incredibly expensive – but you can buy it on-line from United Nuclear if you’re desperate
that is too cool….
like me…spending my half term hours checking out my physics teachers website…
It’s the definition of cool, as we all know.