Boron Applications

Boron fibers can be added as a strengthening material to many composites.

Due to its high capturing cross-section (3x10^-25m²) the C and B₁₃C₂) are extremely hard ceramic materials, so they may be good abrasives. Until recently they were used as materials for dental drills.

Due to its excellent dielectric and insulating properties, BN as well as pure boron and other boron compounds are used in electronics, e.g. as a substrate for semiconductors, microwave-transparent windows, structural material for seals, electrodes and catalyst carriers in fuel cells and batteries. It is widely used as an abrasive as well as a material for cutting tools. The diamond-like allotrope of boron nitride, one of the hardest materials known but is softer than materials such as diamond, known under a name Borazon, is widely used as an abrasive for industrial tools. Gaseous boron fluoride, BF is used in neutron counters.

Aqueous alcoholic solutions of burah and boric acid are applied in medicine as antiseptics. In living conditions they are often used as a relatively nontoxic insecticide, for killing cockroaches and many other insects: burah, after getting into the digestion system, forms needle-like crystals which destroy the internals.

Some boron organic compounds, especially boranes (boron and hydrogen), he most important of them are diborane B₂H₆, pentaborane B₅H₉, tetraborane etc., may be applied as very high-energy aircraft and rocket fuels. Polymeric compounds boranes, such as Carborane-22, are chemically and heat resistant.