unobtainium
Sign in to saveAlso known as unobtanium, handwavium, buzzwordium, impossibrium, raritanium, hardtofindium, phlebotinum, eludium
Unobtainium (or unobtanium) is a term used in fiction, engineering, and common situations for a material ideal for a particular application but impractically difficult or impossible to obtain. Unobtainium originally referred to materials that do not exist at all, but can also be used to describe real materials that are unavailable due to extreme rarity or cost. It can also be used to refer to a device rather than a material.
~7 min read
Encyclopedic overview
8 sectionsContents
- Engineering origin
- Contemporary popularization
- Science fiction
- Similar terms
- See also
- Notes
- References
- External links
Unobtainium (or unobtanium) is a term used in fiction, engineering, and common situations for a material ideal for a particular application but impractically difficult or impossible to obtain. Unobtainium originally referred to materials that do not exist at all, but can also be used to describe real materials that are unavailable due to extreme rarity or cost. It can also be used to refer to a device rather than a material.
The properties of any particular example of unobtainium depend on the intended use. For example, a pulley made of unobtainium might be massless and frictionless. But for a nuclear rocket, unobtainium might have the needed qualities of lightness, strength at high temperatures, and resistance to radiation damage; a combination of all three qualities is impossible with today's materials. The concept of unobtainium is often applied flippantly or humorously.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “unobtainium” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.