From falls to football tackles, most blows to the head occur at odd angles. And those impacts trigger simultaneous linear and rotational head motions. The rotating movement in particular causes shear strain, which is especially damaging to the brain.
A new lightweight foam material could take most or all of that strain off the brain.
Developed by University of Wisconsin–Madison engineers, the new material—a vertically aligned carbon nanotube foam—can dissipate an enormous amount of rotational kinetic energy from an impact. And as a helmet lining material, it could mitigate, or even prevent, traumatic brain injuries by weakening rotational kinetic energy before it reaches the brain.
In fact, the new material is 30 times better at absorbing shear strain than the foam currently used in U.S. military combat helmet liners. The team described the material and its unique properties in a paper published Dec. 7, 2023, in the journal Experimental Mechanics.
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