Radiation-proof fabric developed by students

A group of students from Işıklar Military High School in Bursa developed a radiation-proof fabric as part of their project "Domestic Shield: Sodium Pentaborate."

Tahsin Elmas, a senior at the school, said that before he commenced with the project along with his friends Seyit Alp Herdem and Yaşar Harun Kıvrıl, they studied protective suits in Turkey that protect against chemical, biological and radiation attacks and discovered that they are imported.

Stressing that millions of dollars are spent on importing these suits, Elmas said: "We thought about whether we can produce a domestic protective suit or not and began working on the project under the supervision of Major Mustafa Şevik.

Elmas said that radiation is one of the biggest threats of the 21st century and claimed that they worked very hard to find a solution to this problem. Underscoring that Turkey has claim to 72 percent of the world's boron reserves, he continued: "As we cannot synthesize boron, our national asset is wasted. We have tried to protect our asset by using it against radiation."

Elmas and his fellow students synthesized sodium pentaborate, a type of boron, for the first time in Turkey to produce their protective suit. "Currently, bulletproof materials are used in protective suits, but this material limits movement as well as labor productivity because it is very heavy. The fabric we produced weights five kilograms and I believe this fabric can be used in various fields in Turkey," Elmas explained. He added that the fabric they produced is suitable to be used in hospitals, nuclear power plants and university labs that conduct radiation experiments, as well as on military bases to protect against radiation attacks.

The project came in first place in Scientific and the Technological Research Council of Turkey's (TÜBİTAK) competition in chemistry and its three developers were granted the Young Researchers of the Year Award – the most prestigious award at the competition. The young innovators will also represent Turkey at the World Inter High School Project Competition, which will take place in May in the U.S.