`SR-71 Blackbird`

Brief — Tom mentions a colleague's screensaver to introduce why titanium matters. "Aluminum would have over-aged and fallen apart within hours."

The bulk of titanium we produce in the world goes into paint. It also goes into toothpaste and a few other things — not that it makes your teeth whiter, it's just an abrasive, and it's non-toxic. Whereas lead is toxic, that's how they got rid of lead-based paint. There's not huge amounts of titanium made. We talk about it all the time because we couldn't build — I was somewhere earlier this week and a guy had on his computer screen, the screensaver was the SR-71 Blackbird, all titanium skin. Couldn't have built that plane without titanium. Aluminum would have over-aged and fallen apart within hours. Titanium is a higher melting point, lightweight, high strength, excellent corrosion resistance.