Here's What Kevlar and Your Smartphone Have in Common

You might not believe it, but the same chemistry that brought us bulletproof vests and modern sailing sails also gave us the technology to build your smart phone. But that doesn’t mean these chemists were thinking about these applications when they made their breakthroughs.

Hosted by: Hank Green

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[suzaynnschick]

Here's to Stephanie Kwolek's persistence!

[camillecirrus]

"Steel-reinforced dry spaghetti" is my new favourite sentence.

[cloudscovermyflaws]

“A Kevlar vest makes a pretty bad touch screen” Was that a challenge, Hank?

[tharun]

"Liquid Crystals "
Laughs in OLED

[cloudscovermyflaws]

“A phone is not designed to stop a bullet” Clearly you haven’t met a Nokia.

[davidbass]

Saying "Hello" near end of vid is like having a date first then introductions just before departing.

[asdfrozen]

Before everyone decided that phones must have glass backs, Motorola used to make some kevlar-backed phones.

[sapelesteve]

Interesting video! I had a chemistry professor way back when that worked for the company where Teflon was invented. The story goes that he and another chemist were doing an experiment which didn't go as they expected. The chemical reaction created a substance that did not react with anything nor could any other material react with it. Rather than scrape the experiment, they recreated it and eventually named the product Teflon! Because of their contractual agreements with the company, neither of them ever made a penny from their work developing Teflon!

[raystephens]

Always excellent! Thank you Hank, and "Hello" to you too.

[route]

Great job with the example and animation of ball and net.

[LEDewey_MD]

It is truly wonderful that I'm learning about all of these brilliant women scientists! Too bad no one thought to talk about them back when I was a teenager. Thanks, SciShow! :)

[RandyJames]

3:52 True, while a liquid is a state of matter where molecules are free to move around and fill the shape of its container, isn't that only specific enough to be the definition of a fluid? To be more specific, shouldn't at least another trait be that it doesn't expand to fill its container?

[GlaucoHass]

Someone's sassy for 2021 lol Loved the play of words and general shenanigans

[dracrichards]

Really neat topic thanks for the episode

[SoronQuenta]

Truly amazing that kevlar and LCD are created at the same time. 🤯

[Geolaw]

Remember when the best LCD technology was in digital watches and calculators?

[stanburton]

I have to wonder how many thousands of lives Kowalleck has saved with her invention.

[MassimoPugiDelta]

I certainly knew what they have in common couldn't have been strength and durability:
Kevlar can stop a bullet while if you drop a smartphone from less than three feet the least it'll shatter its display.

[kirilbisikalo]

Love the recent increase in chemistry content)

[nateverge]

I was going to comment about Kevlar sails, but you got it!