A team at the Max Planck Institute of Colloids and Interfaces (MPICI) has discovered new properties of collagen: During the intercalation of minerals in collagen fibers, a contraction tension is generated that is hundreds of times stronger than muscle strength. "This universal mechanism of mineralization of organic fiber tissues could be transferred to technical hybrid materials, for example, to achieve high breaking strength there," says Prof. Dr. Dr.h.c. Peter Fratzl, Director at the institute.