The materials human beings make and use have defined human history more succinctly than anything else. But now, in the midst of what some call the silicon age, it seems clear that the future epochs won’t be so easy to nail down.
“The big story in materials science is complexity,” says William Johnson, professor of engineering and applied science at Caltech. “There is more complexity now from many points of view: more constituents, more chemicals, more phases.” So while a Bronze Age metallurgist could stir together molten copper, zinc, and tin and call it a day, tomorrow’s breakthrough materials could require dozens of components in fiendishly precise proportions.
