3D-printed Y-zipper turns from flexible to hard in less time than it takes to zip your fly
- Y-zipper is a 3D-printed three-sized zipper
- Is flexible when unzipped but rigid when zipped up
- The 40-year-old concept was brought to light by researchers using software and a 3D printer
Let's make zippers interesting again. Right now, they're just part of your coat, pants, or fashionable bag, but what if a zipper could serve as the framework for a cast on your broken leg, or help you construct a tent in one minute? That's the kind of zipper we could all get behind, and apparently, it exists as something called Y-zipper.
Y-zipper is the real-world realization of a 40-year-old design dream. Forty years ago, former Polaroid engineer and current MIT professor William Freedman, PhD, envisioned a three-sided zipper. It would be like a traditional zipper in that it would have pieces that interlock to form a strong bond, but by adding a third side and zipping them together, it could...
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