Today's NYT has an article and nice online slide show about innovative new textiles, from electrically conductive rope to carbon fiber building materials. The article is pegged on a current exhibit at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum called Extreme Textiles: Designing for High Performance. Pictured here is polymer skin (photo by Cary Wolinsky/Aurora):
A process called electrospinning makes fibers out of an electrically charged solution containing dissolved polymers and sticks them onto an electrically charged surface. The fibers fall randomly but form a uniform layer, even on a three-dimensional surface. "It's sort of like spray-on Gore-Tex," said Dr. Heidi Schreuder-Gibson of the Army Natick Soldier Center. "It's very breathable, just like skin."
Link (Thanks, Mark Riedy!)
