MIT physicist explains why karate masters can break concrete without shattering their fists
We often see videos of karate practitioners breaking boards and tiles with their fists or hand blades, and many people wonder, 'Can they break such hard objects without breaking any bones?' A research team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has previously analyzed this question, and in 1979, they published a research paper titled ' The Physics of Karate, ' which summarized the physics behind breaking hard objects with karate.
The Physics of Karate on JSTOR
The Physics of Karate - JSTOR Daily
https://daily.jstor.org/the-physics-of-karate/
There are karate experience facilities in the world that prepare fragile boards and tiles, but karate masters can also break strong boards used for construction. For example, in the following movie, you can see how a thick building board is broken with a fist.
Three layers of building flooring! If the Kyokushin World Champion hits it with all his might, it will break! - YouTube
You can also see him breaking a concrete block with his bare hands in the video below.
[Shinkyokushinkai] 66-year-old karate master's mind-blowing body and destructive power! 66 YEARS OLD KARATE DEMONSTRATION SHINKYOKUSHINKAI KARATE - YouTube
According to the Physics of Karate, written by a research team at MIT, a typical wooden board needs to be bent more than 1 cm to break, and a force of 500 Newtons is required to break a wooden board. Also, a concrete block can be broken by bending it 1 mm, but a force of 2500 to 3000 Newtons is required to bend it 1 mm.
On the other hand, the force required to break a bone is said to be 25,000 Newtons. In other words, human bones are overwhelmingly harder than wooden boards and concrete, so even if you break a wooden board or concrete with your bare hands, your bones will not break.
The research team also conducted an experiment in which they attached four markers to a fist and filmed it hitting a concrete block at 120 frames per second. Looking at the images below taken in the experiment, you can see that the fist is deformed when it hits the concrete block. This deformation may also absorb the impact.
In addition, Michael Feld, a member of the research team, gave a lecture on 'The Physics of Karate' in 1991, including actual trials. You can check the contents of the lecture in the video below.
Michael Feld on the Physics of Karate - MIT 1991 - YouTube
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