Silica or silicon

[Segilla]

Some years ago the Sunday Times carried an article about internal combustion engines being made from simple sand one day. Where did that lead to?

[kempie]

I presume "made from sand" means that they would use sand as the basis to manufacture the engines from silica ceramics such as silicon carbide or silicon nitride.

Silicon ceramics in a humid oxidising atmosphere (such as during fuel-air combustion in internal combustion engines) are prone to converting to the more thermodynamically stable oxide state (ultimately silicon dioxide, which is glass or sand).

http://www.ultrahardmaterials.co.uk/engine.htm l