Superman gets his powers from the Earth’s yellow sun, including his ability to be bulletproof. Now, scientists are finding a way to take that bulletproof ability and give it to everyone else. It’s not the sun that gives the power to the people, it’s a newly developed metal foam armor.

Afsaneh Rabiei, a scientist working at the North Carolina State University, developed metal foam armor made of a “composite metal foam.” It consists of Field’s metal (a soft alloy) and porous silicone foam. It can be created in a few different ways.

Scientists can either cast the metal alloys over metallic spheres, pump gas through the metal while it’s in its liquid state or insert foam into molten metal.

Using those methods, new armor can be created for war vehicles, such as tanks, or heavily used protective vehicles, such as those used in transporting large amounts of money. The best part is that the metal foam armor doesn’t contain any lead, making it extremely safe to be used in body armor and biological systems.

This metal foam has several uses aside from disintegrating an armor-piercing bullet on contact (see below video). It is also able to take twice as much heat as the individual components and can block extremely dangerous radiation. The radiation the foam can be used to transport or block includes X-rays, gamma rays, and neutrons.

As you can see above, the metal foam armor is extremely efficient in stopping bullets. What you can’t see is that it leaves less of an impact on the person wearing the body armor.

“We could stop the bullet at a total thickness of less than an inch, while the indentation on the back was less than 8 millimeters. To put that in context, the NIJ standard allows up to 44 millimeters indentation in the back of an armor,” Afsaneh Rabiei told Tech Times.

The armor containing the newly developed metal foam armor is only about an inch thick and it has three layers. The first layer is of boron carbide ceramics. The second layer is made from the composite metal foam. The final layer can be either a strong aluminum 7075 or a Kevlar panel.

Metal foam armor is rigorously tested and classified as a Type IV armor.

According to the Ballistic Resistance of Body Armor NIJ Standard-0101.06, Type IV armor has to meet the following standards.

“Type IV hard armor or plate inserts shall be tested in a conditioned state with.30 caliber armor piercing (AP) bullets (U.S. Military designation M2 AP) with a specified mass of 10.8 g (166 gr) and a velocity of 878 m/s ± 9.1 m/s (2880 ft/s ± 30 ft/s).” “Type IV flexible armor shall be tested in both the ‘as new’ state and the conditioned state with.30 caliber AP bullets (U.S. Military designation M2 AP) with a specified mass of 10.8 g (166 gr) and a velocity of 878 m/s ± 9.1 m/s (2880 ft/s ± 30 ft/s).” “For a Type IV hard armor or plate insert that will be tested as an in conjunction design, the flexible armor shall be tested in accordance with this standard and found compliant as a stand-alone armor at its specified threat level. The combination of the flexible armor and hard armor /plate shall then be tested as a system and found to provide protection at the system’s specified threat level. NIJ-approved hard armor and plate inserts must be clearly labeled as providing ballistic protection only when worn in conjunction with the NIJ-approved flexible armor system with which they were tested.”

This new metal foam armor is lightweight, strong, and could essentially save countless lives in military and police forces worldwide.

[Photo by Ian Hitchcock/Getty Images]