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You can probably spot fake wood a mile away.
Something about the grain, the texture, the consistency... it's all wrong.
And you might wonder why we even bother trying.
I mean, wood literally grows on trees.
But we have some good reasons for wanting to make fake wood — and some good reasons why it's really hard to do.
One reason we want fake wood is saving our forests.
The thinking is if we can make something that looks like wood and has its properties, we don't have to keep cutting down actual trees.
Plus, wood has an incredibly complex architecture that makes it light yet strong — and this has actually inspired materials scientists to try copying that structure for new lightweight materials.
