In 1903, the Wright Brothers made the world's first aircraft ‘Aviator I’ took the first step to conquer the sky, the aircraft body was mainly made of wood and cloth; in the 1920s, high-strength steel and aluminium alloys gradually replaced timber, for the aircraft inserted the wings of iron and steel; in the 1950s, heat-resistant and better In the 1950s, titanium alloy with better heat resistance began to ascend the stage of history; in the 1980s, high-performance aluminium alloy with its lightweight and high strength characteristics gradually gained people's favor, and became the main structural material of the aircraft fuselage; in the 21st century, composites with its lower density, higher strength and strong designability and many other characteristics began to replace some of the traditional materials, the amount of high-performance composites on the large airliners A350 and B787 have reached more than 50% of the aircraft structure. The amount of high-performance composite materials used in large passenger aircraft A350 and B787 have reached more than 50% of the aircraft structure. Where will aerospace materials go in the future? Europe's largest aircraft manufacturer - Airbus, will turn their attention to nanomaterials.

August 31, Airbus (Beijing) Engineering Technology Center and the Chinese Academy of Sciences Suzhou Institute of Nanotechnology and Nanobionics (hereinafter referred to as Suzhou Nano Institute) held a cooperation signing ceremony in Suzhou, the official establishment of the aviation nanomaterials joint laboratory, the main content of the cooperation, including aviation nanocomposites high-conductivity, high toughness of the technology as well as the development of on-line high-precision monitoring technology, etc.. ‘This is Airbus China's first co-operation with a Chinese research team in the field of aerospace nanocomposites.’ Cheng Long, general manager of Airbus (Beijing) Engineering and Technology Centre, told Science and Technology Daily.

Suzhou Nano Institute, which has long focused on nanomaterials research and development, has carried out research, development and engineering of materials such as high-performance carbon nanofibres and films earlier in the world, and its product performance and capacity are now at the international advanced level. This is highly relevant to Airbus China's development plan in aviation advanced materials, and also lays a solid technical foundation for the cooperation between the two sides.

"At present, the most widely used composite materials on aircraft are carbon fibre composites. Compared with traditional metal materials, carbon fibre composites have low density, high strength and strong designability. However, carbon fibre composites still have many shortcomings, such as poor toughness, poor electrical conductivity, high cost and difficulties in online health monitoring, which limit the larger-scale application of composites in aviation." Lv Weibang, a researcher at the Suzhou Institute of Nanotechnology, said that after years of hard work, the research team at the Institute has successfully produced carbon nanotube films using a variety of preparation techniques, becoming one of the few scientific research institutes in the world capable of manufacturing continuous carbon nanotube films.