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Secret Roman Concrete Discovered – Apparata

Some ancient Roman structures are still standing after almost 2000 years. The secret of this is the Roman concrete that is self-healing. That secret has now been revealed and it will soon be on sale.

The famous Roman concrete dome of the Pantheon has been around for 2,000 years. Source: Wikipedia

Roman concrete lasts for 2000 years

Concrete structures from modern times, compared to Roman concrete, do not last long. For example, concrete rot is a major problem. Concrete has a hard time, especially in a rainy climate.

It was different in Roman times. The oldest concrete dome in the world, the Pantheon in Rome, has been standing for 19 centuries. Italy is known for the many earthquakes that take place there. Rome still receives water through a Roman aqueduct, which is also almost 2000 years old.

If a building lasts nearly 2,000 years there, especially a concrete dome, there must be something special about it. And that seems to be true, because the Roman concrete is self-healing. The Roman concrete is also very resistant to seawater.

Secret Roman concrete cracked

For decades, materials scientists have been trying to discover the secret of Roman concrete, so far in vain. It was only last year that the Americans at the prominent Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston finally succeeded.

It appears that grains of quicklime occur in Roman concrete. If there is a crack in the concrete, and water seeps in, the water reacts with the quicklime to form limestone, which takes up more space and fills the crack.

Volcanic ash

Also, but this was already known, volcanic ash is the reason that Roman concrete was so resistant to seawater. For example, the ancient Romans mixed volcanic ash (pozzolana) with quicklime and the rest of the mixture. This happened, the researchers assume, at a high temperature of around 90 degrees.

As a result, grains of quicklime are retained and the concrete also hardened much faster. The exact technical details can be found in the scientific article in Science. Researchers plan to develop and sell a commercial mixture based on Roman concrete. Hopefully that will then be used to make beautiful buildings, which we should not be ashamed of after 2000 years.

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