Glass Science

Eventually, glass was used in windows, and often could be quite beautiful, such as the stained-glass windows used in Middle Ages churches that survive to this day. Image: Adobe Stock

By Jamie Oberdick

Ceramics and glass are two materials that have been around since ancient times, yet many people outside of materials science are unaware of the impact they have on their lives beyond the obvious.

Read more about Ceramics & Glass: A new vision for ancient materials

By Adrienne Berard

Worldwide, glass manufacturing produces at least 86 million tons of carbon dioxide every year. A new type of glass promises to cut this carbon footprint in half. The invention, called LionGlass and engineered by researchers at Penn State, requires significantly less energy to produce and is much more damage resistant than standard soda lime silicate glass. The research team recently filed a patent application as a first step toward bringing the product to market.

Read more about New glass cuts carbon footprint by nearly half and is 10x more damage resistant

Katelyn Kirchner, a doctoral candidate at Penn State, is on a research fellowship at Hokkaido University in Japan, where she works in a cleanroom to visualize the fluctuations in glass at the smallest possible scale. Credit: Courtesy Katelyn Kirchner.

From fiber optic cables to smartphones, glass is playing a major role in emerging technology. To learn more about how glass will shape future society, we spoke with Katelyn Kirchner, a doctoral candidate at Penn State, who is studying with John Mauro, Penn State’s Dorothy Pate Enright Professor of Materials Science and Engineering.