the.com/elastane
the polymer that lets your jeans lie about how much you ate
means A synthetic stretchy fiber prized for its elasticity, blended into fabrics so they snap back to shape after stretching — better known in the US by the brand name Spandex.
from A 20th-century coinage built from "elastic" plus the chemical suffix "-ane" (the same one hanging off methane and propane), naming the family of polyurethane polymers. The fiber itself debuted in the late 1950s; "elastane" became the generic European term, while America took the anagram route and rearranged "expands" into the trademark "Spandex."
- stretch power
- Can stretch to five times its length
- trademark name
- Better known by DuPont's brand, Lycra
- anagram origin
- Spandex is an anagram of expands
- tiny amounts
- Often just 2-5% of a fabric blend
- born 1958
- Invented by chemist Joseph Shivers