Materials science, together with chemistry, examines many interesting materials. One of the most commonly used and most well known is a material known as glass.
Glass is a material in which sodium and calcium silicate prevail. There are several different types of glass, some of which bear the name of the glass but do not really belong in that group regarding their composition. However, the characteristics of these materials are very similar to those of real glass. Glass is very viscous liquid with a non crytalline structure, and it has no defined melting point. Slow increase in temperature softens the glass, and then it slowly passes into the liquid physical state. When the cooling takes place, the reaction that we described earlier takes an opposite direction – the glass hardens gradually and than takes on a solid state. Glass is a poor conductor of heat. As the surface of a glass object is basically always cooled faster than its interior, a certain amount of tension within the glass matter is created. With the help of rapid cooling of glass, one can achieve an extremely hard surface of the glass object. This kind of glass is resistant to shock, but with some limits however. Although it is very hard, when it breaks, it gets shattered into thousands of small pieces. This feature is used in auto industry, where a glue layer is added to this kind of glass. Because of the mentioned occurence, in the moment when the glass breaks, it is shattered into small pieces, but they are held together because of the mentioned glue layer.
Glass in the modern life has a very big role. First of all, glass is very hygienic. Then, glass is a good insulator, and it has high transparency. Usually, glass also blocks UV radiation. Glass also has many more interesting properties, and if one is interested in learning more about this or similar materials, it’s a good idea to start with some of the basic chemistry related tutorials.
