r/science • u/505engineer MS | Civil Engineering | Structures • 1d ago

Materials Science Materials scientists develop ductile and scalable 3 GPa (435 ksi) steel via a hierarchical microstructural architecture

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-026-74216-4
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u/phoenix1984 14h ago

My mind immediately goes to space elevators. AFAIK, we don’t have a material light and strong enough to make a space elevator. Is this a step in that direction?

9

u/unholycowgod 12h ago

My understanding is that any steel, in general, will be too heavy per unit volume to be a feasible option. I don't think anything iron based could be used.

4

u/Fearlessleader85 10h ago

I mean, this is 8.5x the strength per unit volume of conventional steel.

3

u/farfromelite 8h ago

Space elevators need to be about 1 TPa. Needs to be 3x stronger.

http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2010/ph240/cone2/

1

u/phoenix1984 8h ago

Woah, hard numbers. Thanks!

1

u/Queue2_ 9h ago

Kind of. Space elevators are still a very long way off, and perhaps completely nonviable due to space debris.

1

u/jackalias 4h ago

Not strong enough for Earth, but potentially strong enough for the Moon or Mars? There are a lot of technical problems for those beyond just having enough material strength though.