History and stories of the materials that have changed us, and still change, our lives

Periodically in our country the debate is rekindled on what is more important between humanistic and technical knowledge, between "spirit" and "matter". The beauty is that it is a sterile debate because human beings would not have reached so many goals if they had not been able to move at three hundred and sixty degrees in the knowledge of the world around them. Thus the history of humanity can be told as a series of events, battles and characters. Or as a list of changes in thought and society. Or, again as Silvano Fuso does in his intriguing “The secret of things” (Carocci, 2021, pp. 221) as a long relationship between men and materials.

After all, this is what they teach us already at school: the stone age follows that of metals up to that industrial revolution which, driven by coal and oil, helped to forge the world we live in today. And what are stone, metals, oil and coal if not "things" that we use in every moment of our life together with many other more or less sophisticated materials. In short, the materials - new metal alloys, plastics, semiconductors, new ceramic, magnetic, electrical, optical materials - have accompanied and continue to accompany social and economic progress. In fact, there is no area of activity that does not depend on them.

They might seem talks capable of interesting engineers, chemists, physicists and the like, but this is not how the volume "The Secret of Things" demonstrates and as Silvano Fuso personally confirms:

“From morning to evening we use things: from the digital alarm clock that pulls us out of bed, to the cup with which we drink coffee, from the smartphone with which we read messages, to the helmet we wear on a scooter. Everything docilely performs its function and this thanks to the material it is made of. The piezoelectric quartz crystal of the alarm clock measures the time, the ceramic of the cup allows it to withstand high temperatures, the OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode) display builds the images on our smartphone and the carbon fiber and epoxy resin helmet saves us life in the event of an accident. Technology accompanies every moment of our life: knowing the functioning of the things we use and the properties of the materials they are made of allows us to undergo it less passively and to be more aware of its strengths and limits. Also, knowing things a little deeper, beyond appearances, is fun ”.

In the book you talk about a specific discipline that helps us to know things, the science of materials. What can this science "offer" to us?

“Materials science is the discipline that studies the properties of materials and tries to produce new ones. It mainly uses chemistry, physics and to some extent engineering. Its roots go back to the mists of time: when man chipped the first flint, kneaded the first clay or extracted the first metals. It is no coincidence that the prehistoric ages are distinguished by the name of the prevalent material (stone, copper, bronze, iron). Modern materials science, however, is very young and was born and developed in the second half of the twentieth century. Despite being young, it has offered innovative solutions in various sectors. Let's think about the revolution represented by plastics, starting from the 1950s, and the electronic one, made possible thanks to semiconductor materials ".

What are the materials of the future, the ones that will change our lives the most?

“What the future holds for us is hard to say. Currently the most promising materials are the so-called smart materials and nanomaterials. The former are capable of responding to different stimuli, adapting their response to particular needs. The list is long: piezoelectric, shape memory, photovoltaic and optoelectronic materials, electroactive polymers, dielectric elastomers, magnetostrictive, chromogenic, ferrofluid, photomechanical, self-healing, magnetocaloric, thermoelectric materials, etc. Nanomaterials contain particles that have at least one nanometer size (billionths of a meter). Examples are graphene and carbon nanotubes. Both categories have unique properties that allow their application in countless technological sectors ".

How do you combine the use of materials, their production with the idea of sustainability, respect for resources?

“A large part of contemporary research is precisely concentrated on materials that are sustainable from an environmental point of view. For example, plastics made from plant-based waste have been invented. Alternative materials to traditional semiconductors are sought for energy production. For example, there are photovoltaic cells that use vegetable pigments, such as cranberry juice. Cements and paints (based on titanium dioxide) were then made, capable of reducing atmospheric pollution ".