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"Science Fiction is speculative fiction in which the author takes as his first postulate the real world as we know it, including all established facts and natural laws."
- Robert Heinlein
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| Plasteel | ||
| Extremely tough form of steel, stabilized with stravidium fibers grown into its crystal. |
Plasteel is best known in sf for its use throughout the universe of Dune, particularly if it is important that the object (like a door) stand up to repeated blows. However, Herbert was not the first sf writer to use the term.
| The passage, two paces deep, opened through a heavy door into a square office lighted by golden glowglobes. Jessica passed her hand across the door as she entered, was startled to identify plasteel.
Paul stepped three paces into the room, dropped his pack to the floor... The door behind Paul slammed open. He whirled to see reeling violence--shouting, the clash of steel, wax-image faces grimacing in the passage. With his mother beside him, Paul leaped for the door, seeing Idaho blocking the passage, his blood-pitted eyes there visible through a shield blur, claw hands beyond him, arcs of steel chopping futilely at the shield... Then Kynes was beside Paul and they threw their weight against the door... Kynes indicated the cabinets against the right-hand wall, said: "This way." He crossed to the first cabinet, opened a drawer, manipulated a handle within it. The entire wall of cabinets swung open to expose the black mouth of a tunnel. "This door also is plasteel," Kynes said. "You were well prepared," Jessica said. "We lived under the Harkonnens for eighty years," Kynes said. |
| Technovelgy from Dune,
by Frank Herbert. Published by Putnam in 1965 Additional resources -
|
Although the word is most associated with Dune, Herbert used it a decade earlier in Under Pressure:
Harlan Ellison also used it in Trojan Hearse, published in 1956.
And in Trojan Hearse also 1956:
There was a momentary silence, then the plasteel-armored guards fired at the spot. Angry bursts of flame erupted from their rifles and a section of the wall blistered and exploded inward. Shards of plasteel wall material showered the assembled War Council.
Ellison also used it in Wanted in Surgery (1957):
The word "plasteel" predates the Dune novels (and Ellison's work). During World War II, aluminum was not available to civilians, due to its importance to the war effort. For certain applications, like steel ice trays, some form of metal was needed that did not rust. Manufacturers used steel coated with plastic to prevent rusting; the combination was called "plasteel" by the company that patented the process in the early 1940's - Plasteel, Inc.
Thanks to Bill at Plasteelcorp.com for help with this one.
Compare to herculoy from The Howling Bounders (1949) by Jack Vance,
ultron from Armageddon: 2419 A.D. (1928) by Philip Frances Nowlan,
permalloy from Fugitives From Earth (1939) by Nelson S. Bond,
magnalloy from The Cave of Horror (1930) by S.P. Meek,
helio-beryllium from Out Around Rigel (1931) by Robert H. Wilson and
steelonium from Ralph 124c 41 + (1911) by Hugo Gernsback
What we need is a dielectric as tough as plasteel.
There was a momentary silence, then the plasteel-armored guards fired at the spot.
T he Agent flickered, wavered, and disappeared. A smell of ozone filled the War Chamber.
The woman snapped a finger at the taker, and
a heavy plasteel door slid back
for them.
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Additional
resources:
More Ideas
and Technology from Dune
More Ideas
and Technology by Frank Herbert
Tech news articles related to Dune
Tech news articles related to works by Frank Herbert
Plasteel-related
news articles:
- Plasteel? UM's New Ultrastrong Nanocomposite
- Two Plastics Merge To Create 'Metal'
| Harvard Metamaterials Change Structure Instantly |
| Nano-Chainmail 2D Mechanically Interlocked Polymer |
| Goldene - A Two-Dimensional Sheet Of Gold One Atom Thick |
| GNoME AI From DeepMind Invents Millions Of New Materials |
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'Hocus-pocus religions and archaic weapons are no substitute for a good blaster at your side.'
'Oscar picked up a trowel. 'I'm the tool for the mortar,' the little trowel squeaked cheerfully.'
'... he waited for the robotrix attendant to finish fueling up his ship.'
The Roujin Z system provides care to fully bedridden patients - and then some!
'Aerostat meant anything that hung in the air. This was an easy trick to pull off nowadays.'
'The Ringworld had no horizon. There was no line where the land curved away from the sky.'
'An adjustment panel outside the door would cause it to extrude various appurtenances in memory plastic...'
'Annealed in any shape for a time, and codified, the structure of that shape is retained down to the molecules.'
It's not really polite to tear the limbs off robots.
'...the imaginary companions discovered by needful children.'
