Jennifer R. Vail

So definitely a lot of dimensions still out there for friction to explore.

I think this is an absolutely mind blowing thing that it can, but I do firmly believe that.

And that's because energy is a big crisis we're having.

We wanna reduce energy and reduce emissions.

And friction is such a powerful tool with that.

we have 20% of our energy being spent to overcome friction.

So if we understand where that friction is and identify the unnecessary friction, sometimes we need it for breaking, but sometimes we don't.

That is a lot of energy that we can save.

There are a lot of emissions that we can save.

So it almost seems like in our back pocket, we have this really readily available tool

handy for us to start saving energy start reducing emissions and i just think it's very cool that this force that we've defined as resisting us is really something that can help progress us and move us forward well what did you you said that what was the 20 percent yeah it's estimated that about 20 percent of all of the energy we use in the world is being used to overcome friction

An example could be in a manufacturing plant while you're, you know, trying to machine parts or make parts, you have to put a certain amount of energy in to moving the tooling to machine the part.

And a certain amount of that energy is there because it has to overcome friction.

Like with that amusement park ride we're talking about, it requires more energy to start it up because of all the friction.

Well, if we reduce that friction, then you can use less energy to start the motion and you have now saved energy.

This is actually how we've improved fuel efficiency of our cars and in airplanes.

So it's something tribologists are actively doing, but there's a lot more opportunity there.