Researchers have created tiny building blocks that exhibit unique mechanical properties, such as the ability to produce a twisting motion when squeezed. These subunits could potentially be assembled ...

Self-assembly exists across domains, from colloidal particles in material science to fire ants assembling themselves into rafts during floods. The rules that govern self-assembly between these ...

In my two previous columns, I discussed the lower and intermediate levels of the building block approach for crashworthiness testing and analysis of composite structures. I focused on the commercial ...

What if construction materials could be put together and taken apart as easily as LEGO bricks? Such reconfigurable masonry would be disassembled at the end of a building’s lifetime and reassembled ...

Proteins are the building blocks of life. These biomolecules comprise chains of amino acids that fold into precise shapes to perform specific jobs in nature. But these elegant structures form only ...

A set of children’s building blocks (Anker-Steinbaukasten) that belonged to Albert Einstein Christie's Albert Einstein spent his life trying to understand how the universe was built—its hidden order, ...