A photo from open sources
Wood is considered an ideal building material. She malleable, strong, durable, environmentally friendly, aesthetic, possesses good energy and, which is also important, renewable. Previously, hardly anyone could have imagined that wooden can be not only window frames, but also the “glass” itself, however, this may soon become a reality.
The fact is that the Swedish scientists from the Royal Technological Institute managed to get transparent wood, which, rather of all, it will find application in the production of not only windows, but also solar panels as a cheap alternative to the one used today silicon glass.
Professor Lars Berglund, enlisting the help of his colleagues and students, managed to remove lignin from natural wood fibers. For this, specialists needed dozens of chemical experiments, however, now the Swedish scientist and his team can feel free to state that you have received wooden glass.
Prospects for the development of transparent wood
Lignin is a substance into which walls of plant cells after woodiness. It’s hard a polymer compound formed in vascular plants and some algae. By removing lignin, wood can be made almost transparent, although so far it is inferior in this parameter our usual glass. Swedish researchers currently working just on this problem, getting wood perfect transparency.
According to Berglund, transparency was given to the tree beforehand. polymerized methyl methacrylate. Now scientists have to find compounds that will make wooden glass completely colorless, and also endow it with radiation reflection properties. Specialists want transparency to be adjustable in depending on the area of application of the material. Swedes Already able to get wood that replaces frosted glass. However making transparent material is a real challenge for researchers.
Wooden glass windows are said to be tall. strength indicators and low thermal conductivity. It is assumed that new material can also be used for production computer chips.
Scientists are full of ideas in creating the perfect wooden glass, however, so far they have refused to even report which types of wood best suited for producing such an unusual transparent material.
Time
