The Advance Civil Engineering Materials Research Lab (ACE-MRL) from Ann Arbor's University of Michigan, has developed a bendable concrete that could make infrastructure safer and longer lasting. Drawing inspiration from the brick-like structure found on the inside of a shell, researchers devised an engineered cementitious composite (ECC) which contains tiny fibers dispersed within. The fibers create slippages that allow the concrete to bend.
ECC can deform up to 3 to 5% in tension before it fails, which gives it 300 to 500 times more tensile strain capacity than normal concrete. This allows a slab of it to undergo a lot of bending without fracturing into pieces, earning it the nickname of flexible or bendable concrete.
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