Balsa is a soft, lightweight wood that’s perfectly suited to whittling ... bistro chair that weighs in at 1.3 kilograms, or 2.9 pounds–lighter than Gio Ponti’s 1957 Superleggera.

Imagine cutting a sheet of wood with nothing more than a utility ... Make two pieces like this, and label both number 2. Grab four of the 28-inch balsa cuts. On one end of each piece, trace ...

and test a structure made of balsa wood and glue that will balance and support weights. The team is allowed to use materials other than balsa wood and glue to assemble the parts of the structure.

After testing various wood types, Schwarze found balsa wood to be able to hold on to its stiffness and compressive strength after being exposed to the fungus. Through spectroscopy, a scientific ...