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Capsules of gasoline have been formed into bricks that can be built into rafts for towing on water or dropped safely from airplanes. The bricks are converted back into liquid gasoline by being passed through a wringer. The Air Force is evaluating disks coated with adhesive-filled microcapsules that would break when pressed against the exterior of a spacecraft. The released adhesive would firmly cement the disk to the craft, providing an anchor for an astronaut walking or working in space. Similar encapsulated adhesives would simplify the joining of parts under water.
Bizarre Products. To prepare solids for microencapsulation, N.C.R. scientists grind and filter them down to particles of the desired size. Liquids are suspended in droplet form in other liquids—like salad oil in water—and the mixture is run through an industrial blender that breaks the droplets down into still smaller sizes. The tiny particles or droplets are then placed in a solution of coating material, which congeals around them when the temperature, acidity or concentration of the solution is changed—forming capsules as small as one twenty-five-thousandth of an inch in diameter.
Now that many companies have been licensed to use the microencapsulation technique, or have developed similar processes of their own, N.C.R. scientists expect a flood of bizarre new products to hit the market. Just to be ahead of the game, they have already successfully microencapsulated cocktails; they claim that they can now produce what is literally the world's driest martini.