Admir outlines why Portland cement is ubiquitous: strength, versatility, standardized production, and historical continuity.
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For 2,000 years, there’s been this incredible mystery in material science: how do the Romans build the Pantheon? It’s made of unreinforced concrete, in a seismic zone. After they built it, nobody’s been able to figure out how they did it for two millennia. Until last year when Admir Masic, scientist, professor at MIT showed the world, publishing in the journal Science, showing exactly how the Romans did that.
Cement is the most used material on the entire planet. Between 8 and 13 percent of global CO2 emissions are associated with making cement. Obviously, the most used construction material. We now know – thanks to Admir – how to make cement that lasts virtually forever, use less of it, use less steel, it doesn’t cost more, you can make it in any cement plant, and the kicker is it’s about 20 percent less CO2.
So this is a major breakthrough, Admir is the founder of a company called DMAT, which is commercializing this. I’m so proud to be one of their first investors with the Deep Future Fund.
I couldn’t find a more delightful human to hang out with all year long. Admir’s an amazing guy. He started his life out in Bosnia, became a refugee as a teenager in Croatia during the Bosnian war, and then managed to somehow, go get educated in Italy. Then he became, a researcher at the Max Planck Institute in Germany before becoming a professor at MIT, where he is now studying all the things that you can do with cement and other amazing things we can learn from material science in antiquity. We spend a lot of time talking about cement, but I promise it’s interesting.
We also spent some time talking about Admir’s childhood growing up, as a refugee in Eastern Europe and it’s such a soulful conversation. I’m so thrilled to share it with you guys and I hope you’ll share it with your friends because everyone can get some inspiration from this story.
