The goal of the “liquid armor” technology is to create a new material that is low-cost and lightweight while still offering equivalent or superior ballistic properties compared to current Kevlar fabric. For their work on liquid armor, Dr. Eric Wetzel, an ARL mechanical engineer, and his team were awarded the 2002 Paul A. Siple Award, the Army’s highest award for scientific achievement, at the Army Science Conference. The company D3O invented a non-Newtonian–based material that has seen wide adaptation across a broad range of standard and custom applications, including motorcycle and extreme-sports protective gear, industrial work wear, military applications, and impact protection for electronics. The materials allow flexibility during normal wear but become stiff and protective when strongly impacted. While some products are marketed directly, much of their manufacturing capability goes to selling and license the material to other companies for use in their own lines of protective products. See also References External links Shear Thickening Fluid (STF) Fabric: Publications Liquid Body Armor: Rheologists Apply Shear-Thickening Fluids to Protective Gear Army Science: Robots, Liquid Armor and Virtual Reality "Troops to test liquid armour" Continuum mechanics Fluid dynamics Non-Newtonian fluids