Biomaterials: more to come

Plants and animals-renewable resources-have begun to make measurable contributions to materials for equipment design.

In 1940, Henry Ford took an axe to his own car. More accurately, for publicity photos and in live demonstrations, he smacked the axe into a specially made, soy-based plastic rear deck lid of his own car to illustrate the toughness of the plastic. Sometime in late 1941, one prototype Ford was built with body panels of soy-based plastics.

The culmination of decades of Henry Ford's enthusiastic support of materials made from agricultural sources-some date it back to 1910, with a coil cover partially made from wheat gluten and asbestos fibers-came at a bad time. Within a few months, all advances in materials development were redirected to wartime needs. The plastic car languished. Though dent- and crack-resistant, it was not ready for large-scale production.