Aerogel is a new material that is lightweight, soundproof, and insulating, and is playing a revolutionary role in science and technology as well as everyday life. It has a wide range of applications, including gold that floats on water, and its uses range from space dust collection to high-temperature insulation. The technology is currently being developed for commercialization, and in the future, it will become an essential material for many industries and everyday life.
Many years ago, a team of researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich succeeded in creating gold that floats on water. Without mixing in anything other than 20-karat gold. How can pure gold float on water? The answer can be easily found in our daily lives. When you put a bar of soap in water, it sinks. But the soap bubbles left behind after washing your face don’t sink. The reason why soap bubbles float is because they contain more air than soap. A team of researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich used this same principle to create bubbles that are 98% air and 2% gold. Solids in which air makes up the majority of the volume are called aerogels.
The first aerogel was created in 1931 by Steven Kistler, who succeeded in turning the liquid contained in a gel made of silicon into a gas. This is silica gel. Aerogels can be made from a variety of materials, not just silicon. At the time, aerogels were not commercialized due to the cost and time required to make them. However, as technology improved, it became possible to make aerogels from a wide variety of materials, and as a result, aerogels began to be useful in many industries. Today, it plays an important role in architecture, aerospace, and electronics, among others.
Imagine the inside of an aerogel: a bunch of thread-thin skeletons with tons of holes, filled with air. It’s like a bone with osteoporosis. But what happens if you give Aerogel an impact? It would shatter. Aerogel has the disadvantage of being fragile. Because of this, it needs to be handled with care, and research is underway to compensate for this weakness through various reinforcement techniques. For example, there are attempts to reinforce Aerogel with carbon or nanomaterials to make it more durable against impact.
You might wonder what use Aerogel could possibly have if it’s so fragile. However, the properties of aerogels can be very useful in our daily lives and in industry. For example, Aerogel is a revolutionary material in many fields because it is extremely lightweight and at the same time soundproof and insulating. Just as shouting into a sponge significantly reduces the volume of sound, Aerogel can act as an excellent sound insulator. In the field of architecture, researchers are working to harness this soundproofing ability and apply it to noisy buildings and vehicles.
Aerogel also has a very low thermal conductivity, making it an excellent insulator. Unlike Styrofoam or fiberglass, which are commonly used for insulation, Aerogel can withstand temperatures of over 1000 degrees. This makes it particularly useful in industrial applications and fire protection, where insulation must perform in high-temperature environments. Aerogel’s ability to maintain its performance at high temperatures is increasingly being used in a variety of applications, including consumer electronics, apparel, and sports equipment. In addition, the aerospace industry uses aerogels on the exterior of spacecraft to protect against extreme temperature changes.
Another characteristic of aerogel, its porous structure, also plays an important role in scientific research and environmental protection. The Stardust spacecraft, launched in 1999, has been collecting cosmic dust from comets and is a prime example of Aerogel’s potential applications. The porous nature of Aerogel was a big help during the dust collection process, allowing the dust to be collected without damage. Thanks to these properties, aerogels are still used today by the scientific community as an important tool for capturing and analyzing microparticles and harmful substances.
More recently, methods have been developed to make aerogels more economical to produce. In the past, manufacturing costs were too high for widespread use, but researchers at the National University of Singapore and elsewhere have succeeded in making aerogels out of paper, reducing costs and making them more efficient. As Aerogel becomes more widely commercialized, it is expected to contribute to energy savings and environmental protection. In particular, Aerogel will play an important role in improving the insulation performance of buildings and saving energy in the modern world, where energy efficiency is crucial.
The future of Aerogel is even brighter. While Aerogel has been used primarily in aerospace and high-end industries, it will be used in many more areas of our daily lives. Whether it’s for home insulation and soundproofing, or as a thermal barrier in electronics, Aerogel’s applications will continue to grow. Literally as light as air and as versatile as it is, aerogel is a new material that could make a big difference in areas we haven’t even imagined.
