a couple weeks ago I posted about how bone grows into titanium implants because cells can't find the boundary turns out there's a catch engineers have been trying to solve for years: titanium is too stiff (~110 GPa vs spongy bone's 0.02–3.7 GPa) so the metal takes all the load, and the real bone around it actually weakens because physics says "why maintain structure that isn't carrying stress?" (stress shielding) enter selective laser melted Zn-1Mg-0.1Sr gyroid scaffolds: → mathematically generated TPMS gyroid lattice (70% porous, 550 μm pores) → elastic modulus tuned right down to 2.3 GPa so it flexes like real cancellous bone → alloying zinc with 1% Mg + 0.1% Sr precipitates Mg2Zn11 & SrZn13 intermetallics, more than doubling strength over pure zinc (33.7 MPa) → degrades at 0.36 mm/year with zero hydrogen gas pockets and the wildest part as it dissolves, it turns its own surface into calcium-phosphate & zinc-phosphate minerals while feeding Zn2+ and Sr2+ ions that make bone-forming cells grow faster titanium tricks the skeleton into adopting permanent metal this thing holds the load, feeds the bone to rebuild itself, and vanishes when the job is done. radical engineering.

Bape x College Dropout Kanye West from 2007