Scientists working with the Air Force Office of Scientific Research have created a new class of metallic composite materials that could offer greater corrosion resistance among other potential applications, reports Maria Callier. “It’s incredibly difficult this day and age to create new materials with dramatically different properties,” said David Avnir, head of the Institute of Chemistry at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and lead scientist on this work. He added, “The idea of combining organic molecules with metals really opens the door to some exciting possibilities, and the range of preparation methods means there’s a greater chance we can find useful end applications for Air Force missions.”
The Space Force is playing midwife to a new ecosystem of commercial satellite constellations providing alternatives to the service’s own Global Positioning Service from much closer to the Earth, making their signals more accurate and harder to jam.